No Show Ch. 02

Teresa said that she and Todd were going to the Alabama-Auburn game at Auburn, and it was expected that the winner of that game would face the winner of the Tennessee-Georgia game. It's fun when the games mean something, I thought to myself.

The pilots of our aircraft told us that County Airport was busy due to all the Boosters flying in for the game... but our plane had diplomatic status, so we'd get priority to land! "Not even the BOW Enterprises plane could have done that for us." I said to Teresa.

After landing, we went through the terminal building, and saw a number of Boosters awaiting Ubers or other transportation. Of course I'd parked my Police SUV in the 'Authorized Vehicles Only' lot (it is good to be the Police Commander!), and as Teresa and I were headed there, we heard snippets of conversations.

"Wow." Teresa said as we got into my vehicle and began driving towards Police Headquarters through the heavy traffic. "Those Boosters are sure pissed at Dr. Jerry Moore. Ya gotta wonder how long he's going to last as University President."

"I don't see what could cause him to be removed, though." I replied. Little did I know. Little did I know...

Part 14 - Showing Up, Showing Out

"This is Bettina Wurtzburg, KXTC Channel Two News!" shouted the redheaded MILF reporterette at 7:00am, Tuesday, November 9th, from the Anchor Desk of the KXTC studios. "Commander Donald Troy faces the Board of Inquest tomorrow!"

After the hard-charging intro music, Bettina began: "Channel Two News has learned that tomorrow's Board of Inquest, which was convened at the bipartisan request of Republican Mayor Daniel Allgood and Democrat Councilwoman Susan Weston, will focus on Commander Donald Troy's absence despite being called and asked to go to City Hall and help control the situation. Let's go to trusted reporter Amber Harris for more. Amber!"

"That's right, Bettina!" said the short, athletic blonde reporterette from the rooftop of the building at Riverside and College, with City Hall in her background. "Sources tell Channel Two News that the focus of the Board of Inquest investigation is exclusively on Commander Donald Troy!"

Amber: "Investigators are digging into why he sent a call for help to voicemail, why he told others in the Police Force to not call him for any reason because it was his birthday, and why he was not at the scene while his Police Officers were insubordinate to Sheriff Deputies who were in charge at the location."

The feed went to a split-screen with Amber and Bettina. Bettina said: "Amber! What will the consequences for Donald Troy be? Can he be fired or made to pay restitution for his blatant disregard for his duty and for the welfare of his Police Officers?"

Amber: "Bettina, it's not likely that Commander Troy could be fired or punished by the Board of Inquest itself. But the Council could move to discipline Troy or terminate his employment by a simple majority vote, as they would have sufficient probable cause and be able to withstand any legal challenges to those badly needed actions."

Bettina: "Amber, what will the Council be taking up at tonight's meeting?"

Amber: "The Council has not published a formal agenda for the Council meeting beyond the vague and bland 'submission of documents', 'Old Business' and 'New Business'. However, sources tell Channel Two News that Republican Town Assemblyman Ryan Paulson may address the Council to propose the closing of many of the Free Clinics on the southside of Town, forcing many of the County's poorest residents to have to buy private health insurance in order to receive medical care. Back to you, Bettina!"

"Thank you, Amber!" said Bettina. "And now let's go to Channel Two Sports reporter Jeff Hull for more on this weekend's games as well as controversies within the Conference. Jeff!"

"That's right, Bettina!" said Jeff Hull, who was shown with University Memorial Stadium as his backdrop. "The University Bulldogs suffered a humiliating home loss to the Tigers, 35-14, causing some Boosters to question if Coach Ted Thrasher is still the right choice to coach the team."

Hull: "The loss was made worse by Eastern State's win over the Wildcats, 30-27. The Wildcats were missing linebacker Davis Smith in the first half, after he was ejected for a dirty hit on Bulldogs quarterback Lawrence Watson the week before. Eastern State ran out to a 27-0 first half lead, and survived a furious Wildcat comeback in the second half."

Hull: "If the Bulldogs had won, they would be in the lead to go to the Conference title game. However, the loss keeps them behind not only the Wildcats, but Eastern State and the State U. Purple Hawks. And in other news, Georgia defeated Tennessee at home, 27-13, giving them the huge edge to represent the SEC East. With Auburn and Alabama both winning this weekend, it looks increasingly likely that the winner of their game will face Georgia in Atlanta."

The feed went to a split-screen with Bettina, who said "Jeff! Did the emergency meeting of the Conference take place? And was (Wildcat School) heavily sanctioned for their low class actions attacking the officials as well as a Bulldogs player?"

Hull: "Bettina, there was a meeting. But it broke up without any action being taken at all. The Conference's Department of Officiating will be taking up the matter of the treatment of the officials, but several Schools said the Wildcats fans were provoked by several poor officiating calls. And several Schools let out some frustrations with what they called systemic officiating biases that are even worse than what Tennessee fans accuse SEC officials of!"

Hull: "And the overwhelming sentiment of the Conference and all the member Schools... except our University Bulldogs, of course... is that Bulldogs quarterback Lawrence Watson provoked the Wildcats fans first. This won't be resolved any time soon, Bettina..."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

"First I'm hearing of that." I said as I, Sheriff Griswold, ADA Paulina Patterson, Chief Moynahan, Deputy Chief Muscone, Chief Deputy Cindy Ross, and Lt. Commander Teresa Croyle drank coffee and listened to the broadcast in the Chief's Conference Room.

"What's that?" barked the Sheriff.

"Ryan Paulson going to the Council meeting to get the Free Clinics defunded." I replied.

Cindy said "What the hell is his problem? And why didn't he do it through the Budget process when he had the chance, instead of trying to get the Council to do his and the Republicans's dirty work for them?"

"Don't let it get you upset, Cindy." I said. "One Council Member's daughter is practically my daughter's sister; Marie spends as much time with us as she does with her own family. That is not a complaint; Marie is a joy to have around. But my point here is that Edward has not said a word to me, nor Stephanie to me or Laura, about Ryan Paulson planning to go to the Council meeting. Ergo, I think that was totally Fake News, ginned up by Bettina and Amber."

"Why?!" came a chorus of Angels, and Paulina, too.

"First," I replied, "while I'm thinking about it: do not believe for one minute that the Board of Inquest is going to be all about me. They're going to ambush you, Sheriff, and the Public Safety Department over the preparations for security, and then the 'what did you know and when did you know it' stuff that Mayor Allgood wants to make public."

"Why do you say that, Mister Crowbarrrr?" drawled the Chief.

"Because that's the way they've been playing this all along." I replied. "Bettina and Amber are saying what they want to see happen, not what actually might, especially about a simple majority of the Council voting to get rid of me. Me not showing up at that incident is not criminal dereliction of duty, which is what they would have to show."

"That's true." Paulina said. "You'd have one hell of a lawsuit if they tried to fire you."

I nodded, then continued: "And as to Ryan Paulson, he won't be at the Council Meeting tonight... but he will be in the near future."

"Flawlessly logical!" Tanya exclaimed with great perkiness. "Now share that logic with the rest of us." There were murmurs of agreement.

I said "Bettina and Amber reported that in order to get the agitators wound up, and give them the excuse to protest at tonight's meeting. So let's be ready for that, but I digress. My thesis is that Bettina would likely not report something so obviously false that Ryan Paulson could come out and say he never said he was going to do that, and thus give me more fodder for my lawsuit against her."

Me: "Ergo, Paulson has discussed with the Press that he intends to primary Daniel Allgood for the Mayor position. And one of his platform planks will be over the Free Clinics... I'm sure BigBenefitInsurance will be contributing heavily to his campaign... and Paulson will bring it up in the Council meeting to force Daniel Allgood to go on record with his own position on the Clinics."

"Good grief, you go deep sometimes." growled the Sheriff.

"Mmm, yes he does." Paulina said, causing Tanya to burst out laughing, and Teresa, Cindy, and the Chief to look at her in shock...

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

After the coffee klatch, I went into MCD and shook Eastern State grad Lt. Theo Washington's hand. "Good game, Theo. Your guys played great, and it looked like a cleanly called contest."

"Thank you, sir." said Theo. "It didn't hurt that Davis Smith wasn't available for the first half."

"That didn't matter." I said. "Davis Smith doesn't play on offense, and the Wildcats's offense sucked the first half. Zero points? You gotta be kidding me. Anyhoo, you guys have a shot at the title, now, and I'm rooting for you."

"Sir," said Lt. Joanne Warner, trying to start trouble, "you're not rooting for the Bulldogs if the Wildcats are out of it?"

"Not this year." I said with some venom in my voice. "Not after that joke of a call, and Bulldogs quarterback Lawrence Watson acting like a jerk. That guy better hope he never gets pulled over for DUI in my jurisdiction."

Joanne stopped trying to make trouble. Theo and I talked for a minute about the Conference and the emergency meeting, then I retreated from the MCD room...

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

6:30pm, Tuesday, November 9th. The well-dressed black woman walked into the corridor behind the public Council Chamber, past the Sheriff's Deputies at the entrance doorway to the left (west) side of the Chamber. (The bench where the Council sits is north, as the crow flies).

She went to the other end of the hallway, which ended in the door going into the right side of the Chamber audience area. A door for an electrical/wiring room was also there, but it was securely locked. But there was also a fire exit door to the outside there. It had an alarm on it, and one of those bars one had to push to open it, which would set off the alarm... but two weeks before that alarm had not gone off when the door was open, it had been deactivated, and protesters had swarmed inside through the door.

The woman went to the door and pushed it, but the door would not open. She then pushed on the alarm bar...

*WHEE!* *WHEE!* *WHEE!* *WHEE!* *WHEE!* *WHEE!*

The alarm triggered the building alarm, so the entire floor was full of irritating noise. As the Deputies came down the hallway towards the woman, she went on through the door to the outside and hurriedly went down the steps to Courthouse Square.

"FREEZE!" yelled a voice. She found herself confronted by four TCPD Officers in heavy combat gear, their service weapons drawn and pointed right at her. Other Officers were getting other people out of the potential line of fire.

The woman became belligerent. She began yelling at the Officers for accosting her. Then one of the Officers came up and removed her Police helmet.

"I'm Operations Commander Teresa Croyle." said Operations Commander Teresa Croyle. "We have you on tape every step of the way. You are under arrest. You can come quietly, or I will take your ass down."

"Fuck you, Cracker!" the woman yelled. Teresa reached for the woman's arms, and the woman fought out of her grip, only to find herself taken to the ground in one motion of well-practiced Aikido.

"I CAN'T BREATHE! I CAN'T BREATHE!" the woman yelled. "POLICE BRUTALITY!" As a number of black persons came up and began videoing with their cellphones, Teresa cuffed the woman's hands behind her back, and Detective Joan Laurer came up and helped bodily pick the woman up.

"You can stop with your bullshit." Teresa said as she and Joan roughly escorted the woman to a waiting Police cruiser. "We've got you on video for resisting arrest, assaulting Police Officers, as well as trying to bypass security by opening the fire exit door. That last one can be a Federal terrorism charge, and you may wake up in Cuba in the morning. And if you do, you'll be lucky. Because otherwise it's ten years in prison for you."

"Eat shit and die. Cop." replied the woman, her voice full of unappeasable hatred.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

7:10pm. A trickle of people were coming in, mostly black. The young white people smelled bad; they didn't seem to consider personal hygiene all that important. No one had on any red Antifa shirts or green Climate thug shirts, because they knew they would be denied entry to the Council Chamber if they were so attired. About 60 people had gotten into the Chamber, but they were not misbehaving in any way.

Senior Deputy Sheriff Louis Bailey had 20 Deputies with him, standing at the bottom of the left-side stairs in a group. Closer to the Bench behind which the Council Members sat were Cindy Ross and Teresa Croyle.

"I don't get it." Cindy said to Teresa as they watched the trickle of visitors coming in. "Don was absolutely sure the protesters would try to get in."

Teresa said "Maybe the Deputies did stop them. We caught that one woman trying to open the fire exit door. So maybe they were stymied."

Council Members were coming in at random from the door in back left, behind Kelly Carnes's seat. Mayor Allgood came in and surveyed the audience. Kelly Carnes came in with a large box and hoisted it up the steps of the audience on the right side (the far side) and put it down next to the door of the A/V room... which stretched the length of the back wall behind the audience seats.

Mayor Allgood had taken out his cellphone and made a call. He then looked frustrated and came over to Cindy and Teresa. "Where's Troy?" he asked, his voice harsh and rude.

"Commander Troy is not here." said Teresa. "I'm here. What do you need?"

Allgood said "I'm trying to call him, but it goes to voicemail."

Teresa gave Allgood a full-bore 'Teresa Cunt' look and said, her voice full of venom, "The way you've treated him the last two weeks, it should be no surprise to you that he's not taking your calls."

"Watch your tone with me, Commander." Allgood said darkly.

"Or what?" Teresa hissed, turning to fully face him. "What are you gonna do? Report me to my boss? Try to get me fired?"

"Geez, what's gotten into you?" Daniel said as he tried to dial a number.

"The truth about you." snarled Cindy. "Asshole."

Daniel just stared at the two women for a moment, then said casually, a bit too casually, "Where's the Sheriff?"

"Not my day to babysit him." Teresa said.

"Since he's not here, Chief Deputy Ross, I'll ask you." Allgood said, his voice formal and icy. "Is this Chamber going to be secure for the meeting tonight?"

"It should be." Cindy said.

"I'd like to hear that from the Sheriff himself." said Allgood. "Or from the Iron Crowbar, who is once again a no-show."

Cindy turned and directly fronted the Mayor. "Mr. Mayor, if you think I'm lying to you, if you think there's a problem, then call off the Council meeting and go home. But be real careful what you say to me, or to Commander Croyle, because I'll ram this green crowbar all the way up your ass just on account of your goddamned bad manners."

"Geez, you two are over the top tonight." Daniel said. He walked away from them and out the back exit door.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

At 7:30pm the Council Members and the Mayor filed into the Chamber and stood behind their seats. Mayor Allgood said "Please rise to recite the Pledge of Allegiance."

Kelly Carnes, Edgar Silas, Malinda Adams, and Sheila Sorrells immediately sat down as the others turned to face the American Flag. At the same time, someone went to the box Kelly Carnes had brought up, and began passing out the red t-shirts inside it. The smelly white thugs reached down and pulled out green shirts that had been taped to their lower legs under their jeans.

"RACISTS! RACISTS! RACISTS!" the agitators began yelling as the standing Council Members began reciting the Pledge. And then, in a bigger shock, the back door behind Carnes opened, and red-shirted agitators began rushing into the Chamber! They ran up into the audience seats, and the numbers swelled to at least 200 total.

"All right, let's get out of here." Daniel Allgood said... only to look over and see that red-shirted agitators were massed at the door and were blocking their egress. They were trapped!

The near side audience back door opened and TCPD Officers began pouring in and down the left-side aisle. There were over 100 of them, and they were all armed, armored, and wore helmets with faceplates.

Senior Deputy Bailey said "Stop! Stay in place! Do not attack them as long as they stay in place and don't attack you!"

"Disregard that!" yelled Teresa Croyle. "Kalsu! Begin making arrests! Laurer! Clear that back door and escort the Council Members to safety!"

Joan Laurer had 20 of the TCPD Officers with her, and she began moving to the floor. But the thugs crowding the door and on the floor were equal in number, if not more, and they were ready to fight.

"STOP!" yelled Senior Deputy Bailey. "That's an order! Don't escalate this!"

About halfway up in the audience seats, several large, very fit black men took positions to block the Police coming along the rows of seats. One man, who stood in front of the others as the leader of the pack, was black, 6'7" tall, broad-shouldered, with a mean face. His body extremely muscular, seemingly chiseled out of rock.

His name was Anthony 'Fists of Stone' Wilson. and he was related to the late Jacquez Wilson. (Author's note: 'Consequences'.) He was a rising star in local boxing circles, and his huge ham fists were as big as most people's faces, and really were lethal weapons.

"Come get me, Crackers!" he yelled, raising his right hand and wiggling his index and bird fingers in the 'come here' motion. "Come get me, you gutless cops!"

Robert Kalsu went down the row, between the seats. He had been a Final Four contender in the Police Boxing Matches, and he was well versed in close quarters battle (CQB) and personal combat from military training and experience. He was wearing armor and a helmet with a faceplate.

"You're under arrest." Kalsu said as he approached. "Turn around and put your hands behind your back." To his surprise, Wilson turned around. Kalsu warily approached him.

And then, with unbelievable speed, Wilson was whirling around, cocking his right arm, and throwing a haymaker sucker punch. His massive fist connected with Kalsu's face plate, shattering it as his fist drove into Kalsu's nose.

Fortunately for Kalsu, his shattering face plate mitigated the punch just enough... to prevent his death. As it was, the powerful blow shattered Kalsu's nose as he stumbled backwards. Officers managed to move forward and catch him and pull him back.

"Get him to medical attention." Teresa ordered as she drew her service weapon.