The Nuclear Option

This story is part of an ongoing series.

The chronological order of my stories is listed in WifeWatchman's biography.

Feedback and

constructive

criticism is very much appreciated, and I encourage feedback for ideas.

This story contains graphic scenes, language and actions that might be extremely offensive to some people. These scenes, words and actions are used only for the literary purposes of this story. The author does not condone murder, racial language, violence, rape or violence against women, and any depictions of any of these in this story should not be construed as acceptance of the above.

Part 1 - Prologue

"This is Bettina Wurtzburg, KXTC Channel Two News!" shouted the redheaded MILF reporterette at 7:00am, Thursday, March 7th, from in front of City Hall. "Town Mayor Daniel Allgood is once again under fire from black leaders for outrageous actions!"

Bettina began: "The Board of Inquiry for Police Commander Donald Troy took place Tuesday, with Commander Troy and his Union rep walking out before he was dismissed by the Board. His lawyer, Mike G. Todd of the Madison & Ives Law Firm... again,

that's Mike G. Todd of the Madison & Ives Law Firm

... said that as the defendant in the proceeding, Commander Troy had the right to stop answering questions at any time."

Bettina continued: "Last night, the Board of Inquiry cleared Commander Troy of any wrongdoing by a 3-2 margin. But Eldrick X. Weaver, who lost the Mayoral race on a very controversial Court ruling that discounted some votes in a majority black district, blasted Mayor Daniel Allgood for stacking the Board of Inquiry with two more Commissioners, making a total of five instead of the normal three. Past Boards have had as many as six Commissioners and a presiding Judge, so adding two Commissioners is within the Mayor's legal power. But Weaver objected. Roll tape."

Tape rolled, showing a furious Eldrick X. Weaver yelling "The illegitimate Mayor has stacked the Board of Inquiry to protect Commander Troy from the criminal charges that should be filed against him. Commander Troy committed child endangerment in his actions, and he should be held criminally accountable. I call upon the Town & County Council to fire Commander Donald Troy, and for the SBI to investigate him and charge him for his crimes!"

Back to Bettina live: "As usual, Commander Troy has refused repeated requests by KXTC for comment. The Town & County Police Deputy Chief issued a statement, saying, quote, 'Commander Troy interdicted in an attempted murder, saving a young girl from being murdered by a man who was wanted for several other murders. Eldrick X. Weaver has no right nor business impugning the actions nor the integrity of Commander Donald Troy.', close quote."

Bettina: "The Town & County Council will vote on whether to accept the Board's majority finding, or if it will instead accept the dissenting opinion of Commissioner Finneran and lead Commissioner Silas that Commander Troy put children's lives in danger with his actions, should not be indemnified, and should be criminally prosecuted for child endangerment."

Bettina: "And in State news, Legislators are feeling buyer's remorse after passing a Budget bill that gave Governor Jared the tools he needs to discriminate against and persecute Undocumented Workers. State House Democrats, led by Judiciary Committee Chairman Justin Madoff of the City, are saying that they fully intend to impeach Governor Val Jared. Roll tape."

Tape rolled, showing the deeply corrupt Justin Madoff, the Democrats' choice for Chairman of the State House Judiciary Committee, saying "The Independent State Counsel may not have brought a Grand Jury indictment against Jared, but Mr. Mullen's report's findings do show that Jared abused his authority as Governor. It's up to the Legislature to finish the job and impeach and convict Jared and remove him from office. That is what the People of the State want to see, and what they expect of us."

More tape rolled, showing State House Minority Leader Wilson Hammonds saying "Republicans are ready and eager to work with Democrats to impeach Val Jared. He must be removed from office."

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

"That was a very nice thing you said about Commander Troy, Commander Rossss." said Chief Moynahan in the coffee klatch in the Chief's Conference Room.

"It was true." Cindy said. "I was there."

"Where

is

Commander Troy?" asked Tanya Perlman

"In his office." said Teresa Croyle.

"Still avoiding us?" growled the Chief.

"No sir." said Teresa. "It's legit... today anyway. He's been spending every spare minute he has working on the Tomoko Shimono/Jerry Barsbane situation. He says he has a bad vibe about it..."

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

"Hello and welcome!" said Catrina Pierce at 7:30am, from the KFXU studios. "It's another beautiful morning in our Town & County, and we thank you for joining us. I'm Catrina Pierce, and with me is Meredith Peller. Good morning, Meredith."

"Good morning, Catrina." said Meredith. "And we have a wonderful start to this day, with Mayor Daniel Allgood joining Priya Ajmani for an interview. Let's go right to them now. Priya!"

"Hi Meredith, hi Catrina!" said Priya Ajmani, shown sitting with Mayor Allgood in chairs in his office in City Hall. "Good morning, Mr. Mayor. Thank you for giving us a few moments today."

"Good morning, Priya." said Daniel Allgood, looking every bit like Clark Kent about to burst out of his well-fitting suit and into his Superman uniform at a moment's notice. "Glad to be with you today."

Priya said "Mr. Mayor, you added two Commissioners to the Board of Inquiry that heard the case of Commander Troy successfully stopping a wanted serial killer from murdering a young child. What was the basis of your decision to add those two Commissioners?"

"As you know, Priya," said Daniel, "the Police Union and the Police Captain's Union have formally grieved the presence of Commissioner Finneran on any Board of Inquiry involving a Police Officer, due to Mr. Finneran's rather blatant hatred of and bias against the Police. Mr. Silas, the lead Commissioner of the Board of Inquiry, has refused to remove Mr. Finneran, so I took the necessary... and legitimate... step of adding two other Commissioners to the Board to ensure a fair hearing for our Police Officers."

Priya said "Eldrick X. Weaver, who you defeated in the Mayoral election last November, made some rather shocking remarks. Roll tape." The same tape Bettina had played earlier of Weaver was shown again. When it was over, Priya said "What is your response to Mr. Weaver, Mr. Mayor?"

"First of all," said Daniel, "Mr. Weaver's attacks on Commander Troy are not only unjustified remarks about a man who showed great bravery in saving that young girl, as well as showing bravery on numerous occasions since he joined the TCPD, I believe Weaver's comments border on outright slander. And Weaver knows that I won the Mayoral election legitimately despite an attempt to steal the election, for which a poll worker is spending a year in prison after pleading guilty to attempted voter fraud charges. For Weaver to continue to call me 'illegitimate' is divisive and doesn't achieve anything good or productive. I call upon Mr. Weaver to work with me and the Council instead of continuing to gin up hostility and divisiveness, and false claims of racism."

"Mr. Mayor," Priya said, "the Council approved the Commission to be led by Commander Troy to re-write the Town & County Charter. Do you expect this to go smoothly and with a good result that the Citizens will vote favorably for?"

"Oh yes." said Daniel, then he gave a slightly wicked smile as he said "And I think we're going to find out that Don Troy is a better politician than he's given credit for."

"Thank you, Mr. Mayor." said Priya. She turned to the camera and said "By a 3-2 vote, the Board of Inquiry exonerated Commander Troy of any wrongdoing, saying that his interdiction of the would-be killer was necessary, and that he took proper actions to ensure the safety of the intended victim by not shooting at the criminal with the child in close proximity."

Priya continued: "The dissenting votes included that of lead Commissioner Silas, who was infuriated when Commander Troy refused to continue answering questions and left the proceedings without being dismissed. As the defendant in the case, Commander Troy did have the right to stop answering questions at any time. And back to you, Catrina!"

"Thanks, Priya! Thank you, Mr. Mayor!" said Catrina. "We now have our political correspondent Greg Wallace joining us. Good morning, Greg! Tell us about the Budget deal in Midtown."

"Good morning, ladies." said Greg Wallace, joining the ladies on the sofas in the studio. He looked into the camera as he reported: "Political

experts

are still stunned at the compromise Budget bill that was passed by the deeply divided Legislature and signed by Governor Val Jared a few days ago. It will take effect July 1st, and the biggest changes will be to the State Bureau of Investigation."

"I had a chance to talk to SBI Director James 'Curly' Goodwin off-camera." said Wallace. "He says that the SBI is preparing to create the new SBI-IDE, and it will not be a simple renaming of the SBI-NTF. Every SBI-NTF Agent has been told that they will have to apply to be part of the SBI-IDE, and that those not selected will either be reassigned or separated from the SBI. Director Goodwin also said that he has several names he is considering to be the leader of the new IDE branch, but has not yet made that decision."

"Greg," said Meredith, "will the Governor have any input on who the IDE Director will be?"

"Oh yes, the Governor will have to approve the choice," said Greg, "and that is if the Governor doesn't make the choice himself. But sources tell Fox Eight News that Director Goodwin will be making the selection."

"Any chance it will be Commander Troy?" asked Catrina.

"I would be totally shocked if Commander Troy, who is the SBI Reserve Inspector in addition to his local Police duties, would take that job." said Wallace.

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

At 8:00am, Captains Croyle and Perlman came to my door for the Angels meeting. I had them come in, whereupon they found that Detective Joanne Warner was already in the office with me.

"Take your places, ladies." I said. "I asked Detective Warner to come in for a philosophical discussion of ideas regarding our previous case, regarding Paco. I've been embarrassingly slow and stupid about this, but I finally realized there's a question that needs to be asked: what was Paco's role in whatever plans he, Tomoko Shimono 2.0, Jerry Barsbane, Dick Granger, and Edward Blassingame were cooking up?"

"You asked that question numerous times, sir." said Tanya, being formal with Joanne in the room. "And both you and the FBI determined that he was part of a security team, but may not have had any other role like Shimono and Barsbane might have."

"True." I said. "And I now admit...

that I was looking at it all wrong.

"

"Shut the front door!" Teresa said quietly, but excitedly. "Did I just hear the Iron Crowbar admit he made a mistake?"

"And it's not the first time." I replied. "In this case, I failed to observe and deduce something that was slapping me in the face like my mama whenever I said a cuss word in her presence." All three ladies laughed at that.

"Here's what I was talking to Detective Warner about, in her capacity as a new FBI Consultant." I said. "I was remembering Paco's three attempts to kill Frieda. The first two were by remote, if you will; he used proxies, though I think he was the one following up at the Bypass car crash, and he ran like a dog when I came up on the scene so fast. The break-in at the Barkers where the dog Barky was injured was also not Paco himself, I believe."

I continued: "But the final attempt, on the bluffs overlooking Point Hollow, was made by Paco himself. And Joanne and I talked about this with Muscone and Nash, but I went in the wrong direction with it. I think we were right that a timetable for something led to desperation. But late last night I realized the importance of the first two attempts, and using proxies: Paco's methods of killing are by the martial arts, and if he'd used martial arts to kill Frieda, we would've been onto him through his

modus operandi.

"

"And the reason that is big, I realized," I said, "is because Paco, Shimono 2.0, and Barsbane

were

in cahoots in whatever operation they're doing, after all!"

I had three pairs of eyes locked onto me. They were interested, but not seeing it themselves. That was okay, I thought to myself. I hadn't seen it either...

"So I realized that whatever their plan is, Paco

did

have a part in it." I said. "And what is Paco's skill set for anything? His martial arts skills, his extensive training, and his willingness to kill. So whatever they were doing, the plan involved using Paco's skills as a killer."

"But now he's dead." Teresa said.

"Yes." I said. "

But he was already part of a security team!

And now, that team is one man down, because Paco was sacrificed to finish off Frieda, which thank God he failed to do. But that's a tangent, as well."

I went on: "What I then asked myself was: what if this security team is actually a whole lot more? What if they're part of some overall plan to steal something, where maybe they have to use their martial arts to subdue people or kill people?"

"I

would

say you've been watching too many James Bond movies." Teresa said. "And then I realize that James Bond has had

nothing

on us for the last six years." Tanya burst out laughing at that.

"It does make sense, sir." Joanne said, possibly having listened to Sheriff Griswold's teachings on kissing ass. "It fits all the data we know to this point."

"So..." I said, "Detective Warner, will you go contact FBI Team Lazarus and tell them of my idea? And have Nash or Muscone call me back to discuss it further as soon as they can?"

"Yes sir." Joanne said. I nodded, and she got up and left.

"Okay," I said to Teresa and Tanya, "tell me what's going on in our Police Force."

"I'll start." said Teresa. "I got a call yesterday from a Major General Carl Just in Washington. He'd left for the day when I called him back, so I called this morning when I first got in, as D.C. is ahead of us, time-zone-wise."

Teresa continued: "He asked me if we had an evacuation plan for the Town & County, and mentioned those nerve agents we once dealt with." (

Author's note: 'Frozen Mothballs'.

) "I told him that we have a tornado warning system, and we had a forty-year-old Civil Defense plan from the Cold War era, when we had nuclear missiles in silos just over the State Line and probably the Soviets had a nuke or two with the University's name on it, but nothing really up-to-date. I asked him why, and he said he'd been reviewing that nerve agent case we had, and wondered if we'd followed up by making a plan to evacuate the County if something like that happened again."

"No, I don't think we ever did." I said. "And I'll take the blame for that. I've always had an attitude of 'To

where

would we evacuate?'. Also, if a tornado comes, there will not be enough time to evacuate. And if we get into a nuclear war, or if an asteroid comes to Earth, I want to get my baseball glove and personally catch the s.o.b. And same goes if the Yellowstone super-volcano goes off. No place on earth to hide."

Tanya said "Here's my plan for everyone in the nuclear war or asteroid scenario: bend over and kiss your ass goodbye."

"Ha ha." Teresa said. "But he did raise a good point, sir. If we had something like another nerve agent situation, or a biological threat like anthrax, having some kind of plan might be good."

"God, I can only imagine the panic riots that would happen if we announced anything like that." Tanya said.

"True." I said. "Florida has hurricane evacuation plans that work fairly well, but the preparation for Hurricane Katrina in Louisiana turned out to be a total disaster. So we can come up with something, but theory will go to hell in a handbasket when actual practice becomes necessary."

"Still, sir" said Teresa, "I'm going to start drawing up some plans."

"Yeah," said Tanya, her eyes sparkling as she said "it's not like you have anything to do. You're just sitting in there, twiddling your thumbs all day."

"I know." replied Teresa, her own eyes sparkling a bit as she said: "And at the end of the day, I just take all the paperwork on my desk and put it on the Captain of Detectives's desk, and I go home."

"No wonder Tanya can't get her paperwork done!" I said with my own grin. "Okay, Teresa, it won't hurt to put together some kind of updated plan. But that's really the Sheriff's overall prerogative as the County's Public Safety Officer, so call Sheriff Griswold and talk with him about it. And no public announcements about it, for now. If Bettina heard about it, she'd try to start a panic by announcing it in the worst possible terms..."

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

A few minutes after the Angels meeting concluded, Detective Joanne Warner came back to my office.

"Sir," she reported, "I called the FBI office in the City and asked for SAC Muscone. They said he was in a meeting, so I asked to speak to Special Agent Nash, Jefferson, or Linares. The person on the other end of the line said they were busy, as well. And while she wasn't trying to be rude, I got the sense from her voice that something was going on, and she was trying to get off the line as fast as she could."

"Hmm, interesting." I said. "Let me try to get Jack by the more direct method of speed-dialing his cellphone number."

"Sir, I did that." said Joanne as I was reaching for my phone. "Well, I tried Martin Nash first. He answered, and I told him I had some information from you for him and Mr. Muscone about Paco. He said he'd have to call me back later, that they had some stuff going on. Then he all but hung up on me."

"Okay, then." I said. "Thanks for trying for me. I'll try to call them myself later. So, what do you have going on today?"

"Julia Rodriguez is finishing up her paperwork on the Frieda Franklin cases," Joanne said, "and she asked me and Lieutenant Milton, Myron Milton, to help get some data on the electronics used in Wayne Shaw's car and also the cars on the Bypass that crashed. ADA Patterson has asked for what we have, and she warned us that Wayne Shaw's attorney is also going to ask about it, as well."

"Cool beans." I said. "Anything you send to Paulina, cc: it to Captain Perlman and also to me directly..."

Part 2 - "Meetings"

At 1:12pm, Chief Moynahan called me, Commander Ross, Captain Croyle, and Detective Warner to his office.

"I need all of you, except Commander Ross," said the Chief, "to change into civilian clothes, preferrably nice clothing... like a suit and tie, Commander Troy... and be ready by 1:30pm to be shuttled to a meeting with the FBI. I don't know anything more, so don't ask, but it's big: Muscone said it was an 'all hands on deck' meeting, and for me to bring everyone with a Top Secret security clearance; hence, your presences here in this room now. Commander Ross, someone has to stay behind to herd the cats, so you are in charge while we're gone."

"Yes sir." said Cindy. The rest of us were told to get moving, which we promptly did.

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

A small fleet of four black Cadillac Escalade limousines with Federal Government license plates drove into the gated TCPD parking lot at 1:30pm. To my shock, my lovely wife Dr. Laura Fredricson was in the first vehicle, and I naturally got in and sat beside her. In the shotgun seat was FBI Special Agent in Charge Jack Muscone, and in the seat behind me and Laura were FBI Special Agents Martin Nash and Julius Jefferson.