Chapter Six: Choosing Her Victims
Greg stood outside the museum, watching as the uniforms escorted their witness out and the EMTs took the injured coworker away. "Okay, we've got fresh eyes on this, team. These victims are not random. This is personal."
"Anyone ever accuse your team of bad profiling?" Hastings inquired.
"No," Ed countered, calm in the face of her barbed questions.
"You went in hunting a male disgruntled employee randomly shooting people, when you should have been looking for a woman on a mission."
The team leader kept his cool. "Statistics and experience suggest a male shooter. Now, the profile evolved. We changed our thinking and we found her."
"After thirty-seven minutes," Hastings pointed out.
"After thirty-seven minutes." He was getting annoyed by her constant harping on the thirty-seven minutes, but his instincts were telling him there was something else going on here.
"And this evolving profile- did it add pressure to the situation? Time was against you. Were you feeling stressed or…?"
"Or annoyed?" Ed offered up.
She actually smiled. "Yes. Were you feeling annoyed? Off your game?"
"No," Ed told her flatly. "I was doing my job. We all were."
"It's natural to feel frustrated," Hastings remarked, her implication clear.
Ed went on the offensive. "We had new information- from our search, from the sister, from what Spike found. Now, adjusting profiles as we go is part of the job, just like reading transcripts is part of yours. Let me ask you this. Do typos annoy you? Do they frustrate you? Do they compromise your, uh, your game?"
Hastings' eyes flashed and he realized he'd made a misstep by bringing up the transcript again. "So, if your analogy fits, you were annoyed," she remarked. "Just like I'm annoyed at your refusal to give me the information I need to make an appropriate determination of your team's performance."
"You're asking for information you're not cleared to have," Ed hissed. "Now, two choices here, ma'am. You can accept that the transcript is restricted or this interview is over." He let her absorb that, then demanded, "You got an actual question?"
It took a few seconds for her to respond; when she did, she'd regained her haughty poise. "I do. What did you do with the new information?"
"Anything line up between the shooter and the names of the deceased?" Ed asked.
Greg strode towards the truck as he replied. "Spike's still looking through court records and police reports- anything he can find. He says her sister's here, so I'm gonna see what she knows." He reached out, pulled the door open, and hauled himself up and into the vehicle. A petite, blonde woman with long, fine hair waited inside and he greeted her. "Rachel? Hi. I'm Sergeant Parker. Thanks for coming." Waving towards the seat next to Spike, he continued, "Please have a seat." As the woman sat, Greg fixed her with a serious look. "Do you have any idea why your sister would do this?"
Rachel looked up at him, her eyes both sad and disbelieving. "Claire's been through a nightmare. Her husband Tom had been in the hospital for months. It was horrible. Then last week, Claire…she had to take him off life support. He lasted for a couple of hours, but he didn't make it. Claire's not a very outgoing person. Tom was her whole world. She kind of fell apart."
"What's the connection to this company, to Brenton?"
Wide eyes met his. "Tom had been on Neptysol, a drug made by Brenton. An ingredient in it killed him."
"And that was proven?" Greg questioned in surprise.
She nodded. "He had a rare reaction to a binding chemical. Rare enough to be considered what the fine print calls an 'acceptable risk'."
"And Claire disagreed?"
"Yeah. Claire disagreed."
The grieving woman worked silently on the fine chinaware dishes and cut crystal glasses. Her sister dried as she put them away. In the doorway to the next room, a man in a black business suit and a long gray raincoat stood and spoke to her. "Please, Mrs. Williams." When she didn't turn or look up, he added, "Claire, I need you to reconsider our offer."
"Ben, I think you should leave," Rachel said from her position at the table, speaking for her sister.
Ben didn't even budge. "I'm sorry, Claire. I am so sorry for your loss. And I know that nothing I say is gonna make that hurt any less, but not taking the money is not gonna bring your husband back."
At his words, the woman finally reacted, whirling towards him furiously. "I don't want your money," she spat, "I want your company to change your product."
"Well, I'm afraid that is not gonna happen."
"Well, then we have a problem," Claire snapped.
Ben and Claire locked gazes for a second. "Reformulating Neptysol, that would take years of retesting and research."
"Yes," Claire agreed.
"Now, during that time, we would have to pull it off the market." Claire laughed, a mocking sound in the room. "Now, I know this is a sad time, but I just want you to look at the big picture. Neptysol is a miracle pill for millions of people worldwide. Millions. Now, the binding ingredient that your husband had a negative reaction to…"
"Negative?" Claire shrieked. "Negative?! As in death?"
Ben blanched, but kept going. "That occurs in less than point-zero-zero…"
"We're not numbers," Claire cried angrily, "Your product killed my husband and other people's loved ones as well. That is what this lawsuit is about. Stopping…stopping innocent people from dying."
"Claire, the lawsuit is why I'm here, officially," Ben explained as Claire turned away and went back to her dishes, "Now, your lawyer's gonna call you this afternoon, but I felt, after all the meetings with the company, I'd give you a face-to-face explanation. But there is not going to be a lawsuit."
Claire froze, turning to him.
"All the rest of the families have agreed to take the money," Ben said simply.
She stared at him for a minute, then returned to her dishes again.
"Now, I'm sorry, but that's why I think you need to take our offer."
"I'll fight it myself," Claire muttered, almost to herself as she worked.
"Brenton can afford this dispute," Ben informed both women. "The only question is whether you want to face that fact with or without compensation."
The next few dishes were simply dropped on the ground, shattering, just like Claire's heart as she grieved and sobbed. Two more dishes were hurled down, interrupting any attempts at conversation. Behind Claire, Ben and Rachel exchanged helpless looks.
"When she stopped, I asked Ben how much they were offering. Claire just stormed out. It was four days ago. I haven't seen her since."
Greg regarded the woman soberly, well aware that she was likely about to suffer another loss. It was tragic, but Claire had made her decision. "Thank you. Thank you for coming. If I have any more questions, I'll call." As Rachel made her way out, Greg added one more, "Thank you," to her retreating back. He sat down next to Spike, his focus back on the call. "Find out who's named on Claire's lawsuit. If the names match up with our deceased…"
"We'll know the remaining targets," Spike finished.
Simmons jumped at the wailing from above, but his Muggle colleagues reacted at once. "Boss, she set a fire," Lane yelled.
"We must be closing in," Wordsworth remarked.
Scarlatti's alarmed voice came over the device in Simmons' ear. "Guys, there's gonna be an automatic lockdown."
"Wordy, go, go, go!" Lane roared, already racing for the door with Simmons on his heels.
They reached it as it finished slamming shut, drawing a snarled, "Blast it!" from Wordsworth.
Simmons looked around and spied the fire, in a silver, waist high can. Without missing a beat, he drew his wand and aimed it. "Aguamenti (4)!" A jet of water flew from the wand tip, striking the fire and extinguishing it in moments.
Lane gave him an appreciative nod as he ordered, "Spike, override this lockdown now. She's buying time."
"I'm trying," Scarlatti called, a beeping noise in the background, "But they just renovated this museum."
"I don't care," Lane yelled, pounding on the closed door.
"No, you do," Scarlatti moaned, "The security system's upgraded."
"Spike, do it now!"
"I haven't dealt with a 2700 before."
"At which point your team leader responded with some colorful language," Hastings observed to the tech sitting across from her.
"Ed says what he thinks," Spike replied.
"Profanity is an expression of loss of control. Not very reassuring for a team leader."
"He didn't lose control," Spike disagreed calmly.
"He didn't make it harder for you to think clearly under pressure?"
"No, he didn't."
"Are you sure?" Hastings pressed. When Spike nodded, she continued, "Active shooter, direct to threat imperative, and you cost your team valuable seconds trying to open a door."
"That wasn't 'cause of Ed, that was because I didn't know this particular system," Spike explained.
An insinuating note entered Hastings' voice. "Doesn't your team count on you to be familiar with all the advances in security technology?"
"I am," Spike countered, "I stay on top of every release, but the 2700…"
Hastings cut him off. "The bereaved don't want to hear about the 2700. They want to know whether charges of criminal negligence should be brought against the leaders of your team for the deaths that occurred after your arrival."
Spike didn't turn so much as a hair. "When I was unable to override the security system and unlock the door, Inspector Simmons took care of it. If he hadn't, Ed would have."
"When you failed."
"When I failed, Simmons succeeded," Spike retorted, still calm. "The team succeeded. We all have our roles, our strengths, and our weaknesses. We work together. We're not a bunch of guys; we're a unit."
Ed opened his mouth to take over, but Simmons, once again, was one step ahead of him. The wizard moved so he was facing the center of the door and aimed his wand. "Get back," he ordered calmly. Ed and Wordy obeyed, getting behind their magical counterpart. With a sharp gesture, Simmons snapped, "Erumpo (5)!" The door flew upwards, vanishing back into the ceiling with a clang. The three men hurried forward, ducking under the door and reaching the other side before it could crash back down again.
Simmons looked over his shoulder at the door, still eerily calm. "Not a problem," he drawled.
Ed followed his gaze a moment, then strode past the wizard to take up the trail again. "Simmons," he called without breaking stride, "Good work."
Simmons blinked, surprised at the approval in the team leader's voice. Then he hurried to keep up, casting a quick detection spell and perimeter spell as they hit the next room.
[4] Latin for 'mind water'
[5] Latin for 'break out'
Author note: For any who are unaware, I did post a new Side Story ("What the Wise Man Saw") this Wednesday when my job declared a snow day. Also on the RL front, we have started learning about what we'll be spending the rest of our training on, a software development program called Pega. Everyone's on the same page, which is to say, the first page with only the barest inklings of what this software can do and what its terminology is.
Lord Willing, now that we are all on the same experience level, it will be easier for those of us with less experience to keep up and thus stay in the program. After having observed the past few weeks, I'm probably in the middle back of the pack, particularly since I do not have a Bachelor's in Computer Science, though I do have an Associate's in Computer Programming. (My Bachelor's is in Aviation Maintenance). I suspect my friends and family would argue that I'm selling myself short, though I, in turn, argue that selling myself short is better than exaggerating my skills to superhuman levels.
At any rate, it looks like I will have spare time to spend with my family, praise the Lord, and so I'd best get onto finding a good place to have dinner rather than rambling on in this author's note.
Happy Reading, Have a great weekend all, and Please Keep Praying,
sunstarunicorn