Starting the Slowpocalypse (Books 1-3 Omnibus)

by James Litherland

  Still, Caroline didn’t want to rush into the issue or be seen pushing them toward it. “Thank you for finally joining us, Ms. King.”

  Sara paused as she was sliding out the chair between Alice and Jeffrey and aimed a frown at Caroline. “Maybe you didn’t hear about the really rough night we had. I was with your daughter, so I’d have thought you’d know and give me a break. We were busy trying to keep people like you and the director from being harassed in the night.”

  Caroline smiled. “Well, if people really want to complain that badly, perhaps we should invite them to a council session and show them we are willing to address their concerns in a more suitable setting.”

  No one seemed to know how to react to the suggestion. Caroline would likely be the only one comfortable performing in front of a live audience—she had plenty of experience. Although Alvin Fox might surprise her. Perhaps inviting the public wasn’t the best idea, but it would certainly be a lot livelier than usual. Definitely more entertaining.

  But before she could introduce the subject they were all waiting for, Dean Kittner suddenly stood up and started speaking. “I might as well go ahead and say it now. I’m nominating myself for First Councilor. I’ve been representing the real interests of this community from the beginning. I know how things should be run, and as I’ve been fighting on behalf of the teachers and students all along, I’m sure I have their support.”

  She looked down at Sara on her left and Professor Johnson on her right for a show of that support, but it wasn’t immediately forthcoming. Sara pursed her lips as she slouched in her chair, in thought, apparently. Tracy cast her gaze around the table looking at each of them in turn before landing at last on Alice.

  “I’m not really on this council, Dean Kittner, so I’m not sure it would be appropriate for me to commit Dr. Harker’s support. I’m really just here to observe and report back.” She paused and bit her lower lip. “Maybe I could just call her?”

  Alice squinted hard at the woman. “I don’t see why you should bother her. You’re not committing her to anything, unless you think she might want to run in the election herself. It’s not a huge decision. Today’s the day we decide who the candidates ought to be. So unless you’ve got an objection to my even running, just go ahead and second my nomination.”

  Professor Johnson looked around again, seemingly to see if anyone else had any objection, before finally nodding at Alice. “I guess I do. I mean that I second your nomination, not object.”

  Dean Kittner sat with a sigh of relief and turned to Sara. “I don’t need a third, but it would be nice—after all, I’ve done so much for the students…”

  Sara shrugged. “You just said you don’t need it. So why should I?”

  Caroline appreciated the advantage of allowing Alice to continue trying to bully more support from her fellow councilors, but she needed to nip it in the bud before it went any further. “Dean Kittner, your nomination has been seconded, and you’re now officially a candidate. Congratulations. Now I’m going to throw my hat in the ring.”

  To her astonishment, the minute she’d finished speaking, Ms. Belue raised her hand. “I second the nomination of Caroline Sanderson.”

  There was a moment of stunned silence, but not because anyone was surprised to hear Caroline was running—they must’ve expected that. Verity’s swift second though, that must’ve come as quite a shock. It had to Caroline.

  Then Alice leapt back to her feet. “It’s not proper. Her husband is the director, and this would just let him keep making all the decisions. It would turn this council into a sham.” She glared down the table at Caroline. “It’s a conspiracy.”

  It was slightly less surprising now, to see Verity coming to Caroline’s defense. Ms. Belue cocked her head at Dean Kittner with a puzzled expression. “It isn’t a conspiracy. It’s not even a big decision—isn’t that what you just said? I wouldn’t want to run myself even if I could, but Mrs. Sanderson would clearly like to.” Her tone said she didn’t understand why anyone would. “And I think people ought to have a choice. Even if it’s not much of one. You can’t have it all to yourself, Alice.”

  From the look on Dean Kittner’s face, that’s exactly what she’d wanted. It wasn’t realistic, but then she’d never been a pragmatic woman—she was clever enough though, to ignore Verity and keep her fire trained on Caroline. Alice understood who her real opponent was.

  “Whether you run or not, everybody must know you can’t represent the community as a whole. You shouldn’t be allowed to sit on the council as it is. It gives the administration two votes.”

  Caroline smiled. “Out of seven. And only if you assume I always vote with my husband, which obviously isn’t the case. Anyway, my constituents chose me to represent them, and if I don’t do a good job of that they can choose someone to replace me. That’s how democracy works.”

  Of course, the woman had never married, but it amused Caroline to think that Alice might really believe she’d automatically support Miles in whatever scheme he might concoct. The residents had plenty of reason to know Caroline wouldn’t hesitate to oppose her husband. And while she’d worked together with Verity in the past, no one knew about that—the notion that the two of them could conspire together, then, should sound completely ridiculous. Comical. To Caroline, the idea was intriguing.

  A gentle cough brought both women’s attention to Mr. Fox, who’d been leaning back to watch their exchange with amusement. Now he leaned forward and spoke. “If the residents of this community are supposed to have a choice, I don’t see how they have much of one between you.” He turned his beguiling gaze on Dean Kittner. “You’ve been hip deep in this administration since the start. You even said so as a reason why you should run things—but now you are trying to position yourself as an outsider?”

  He then turned that sweet smile on Caroline. “I have to wonder if you would oppose your husband—if things got really rough around here.”

  Caroline bared her teeth at the man. “If you are trying to be offensive, Mr. Fox, you’re succeeding. I have to wonder how it is that you became a successful salesman, when you talk like that.”

  Smiling wider, Fox shook his head. “It’s not you I’m speaking to, but the rest. You and Dean Kittner are both intimately tied to this administration. And what people really need in a leader is an outsider, as much as anyone can be an outsider here. While that wouldn’t be either of you, it could be me.”

  Alice objected. “You only started as a councilor two days ago. Why don’t you try learning how to do this job first, before you try to run everything?”

  “Mrs. Sanderson doesn’t have any executive experience, and you’ve only run a bureaucracy. I built a business from the ground up and made a success of it. And I did that by learning how to listen to my customers. I can figure out how to run things here, just by paying attention to the people. And I’ve not only supervised workers, but I worked my way up to become my own boss. So the workers should know that I understand their needs too.”

  There was a short silence. This time it was Jeffrey who broke it. “The man makes a good point. I second his nomination.”

  Caroline grinned in admiration. Fox had played that beautifully. “It seems we have a third candidate for this election. Welcome to the fray, Mr. Fox.”

  “Thank you, Mrs. Sanderson. Whatever the result of our little contest, we’ll be working together a lot in the future. I hope we’ll be able to do that in a congenial atmosphere.”

  Now she knew. Fox was by far her most dangerous opponent. Alice had made a good start on making herself irrelevant, and all of a sudden Alvin had positioned himself as the people’s champion. Caroline needed to close this session before Sara decided to put her name forward and Tracy thought it might be nice to have a fourth candidate in the race.

  “Alright then, since we’ve settled the main issue we had before us today, maybe we should shelve the rest of the discussion until the next meeting. We all have a lot to think about, and preparations to make.
We have less than a week until election day.”

  Caroline barely waited for the nods and ‘ayes’ to formally end the session. She’d planned her tactics believing Dean Kittner was the one she would need to defeat, but she would have to shift strategy now if she was going to have a chance of competing against Mr. Fox. And she meant to win.

  Chapter 9

  Putting Out Fires

  11:55 p.m. Wednesday, May 21st

  KAT glided through the shadows between the pools of light cast by the lamps dotting the neighborhood. Those patches of nighttime glow barely illuminated the small family homes and the worker dormitories sharing the same section of land. So many different people from different backgrounds living here close together made it a good place to patrol. When tempers flared, angry arguments could easily ignite into violent altercations. And she’d noticed those blazes popping up more frequently of late. Also, she found running through the dark compound was helping to shake off some of the accumulated stress of the day. Standing in for Chief Cameron had been trying.

  While the physical demands of the job had been light, dealing with even the straightforward bureaucracy of the Guards had been alternating frustration and mind-numbing tedium. It had taken more of a toll than the most strenuous exercise ever had. Kat hadn’t known, couldn’t have guessed, how the chief had been shielding her from that daily grind. Until today.

  When he’d first promoted her to be his lieutenant, he’d put her on night duty. That had suited her fine as she was a night person anyway. And her job ever since had been mostly training and supervising the regular guards, who’d had a lot to learn, and she had really enjoyed the teaching.

  The fun of that portion of the job had to be the only reason Cameron had remained as chief. It was small compensation though, for having to spend so much time dealing with all the tiny details involved in running the Guards. Scheduling personnel she’d understood—she’d had to do some of that on nights. But now she needed to arrange shifts for the clerical staff and the cafeteria workers and the maintenance men as well as all of the guards. That would’ve been alright by itself, but she’d also had to respond to requisition requests—then follow up to make sure the orders for supplies of all kinds were sent in a timely fashion and with all the proper paperwork. And no doubt she’d have to check to confirm it all arrived.

  There were also all the complaints about things that needed fixing, which people came grumbling to Kat about after freely airing their grievances almost everywhere else. Only they never seemed to bother bringing those issues directly to the attention of the people who might actually be able to address them. So she was quickly learning that she needed to try to keep on top of those problems herself.

  In addition, a big part of her morning had been taken up listening to Mrs. Hudson’s moaning about the lack of proper provisions for the kitchens. They were completely out of flour now. But what did the woman think Kat could do about it? Evidently everyone thought there were hidden hoards of supplies somewhere, and Kat should use her influence as the director’s daughter to get some for the Guards.

  Kat had actually called Ms. Belue and asked and been told that there were no secret stores of wheat—that the administration knew about anyway. If anyone still had flour on hand, they weren’t advertising the fact. That didn’t surprise Kat, but she doubted if she could convince the cafeteria supervisor, though she’d have to try and probably waste another morning in the process.

  Amid all those other problems she’d had to deal with, she’d had to put up with Officer Belue coming to take a blood sample and ask a bunch of intrusive questions. Though she hadn’t even a sniffle.

  Only coordinating the guard duties for the day with Sgt. Rose hadn’t been a headache, but she’d accomplished that before she’d barely begun. So now she was working out her frustrations, literally. And patrolling the compound helped alleviate her anxieties about the rising hostilities among the residents. Kat could have told them she was just as upset over the very same things as they. Though no one would be likely to believe her.

  The one bright spot to her day had been making an executive decision to start the program that gave everyone access to the feeds from the cameras in the buffer zone on their FURCS pads. Thus eliminating the job Lacey had been doing, sitting in front of the monitors all day, Kat could then move the woman to a regular guard rotation. A number of guards grumbled about giving the former mercenary a gun, even about having to work with her. Kat had let them all know in no uncertain terms that the Guards was not a democratic institution, regardless of what reforms were taking place elsewhere in the community. And that whether they liked her decision or not, they still had to accept it.

  Finishing her circuit of that one neighborhood, she crossed a darkened street into the next, gradually working her way toward the southern residential section, where she still expected more trouble. She had suggested Salazar keep an eye on it too, but she didn’t know if he would. At least he had listened to her suggestion about Sara.

  After her long day at the Guard HQ doing Chief Cameron’s job, Kat had not hesitated at turning the night shift over to Sgt. MacTierney. He’d call her if he needed help, but she didn’t think she’d hear from him. He was fast becoming a capable officer. Also, if there was real trouble tonight, she expected that it would come from the inside, not the out.

  Then she had gone to see Salazar to tell him she wouldn’t be able to patrol all night while working at the Guards all day. She would be out there some, as she wanted to get rid of the tension she felt, but she also needed to get some rest—she certainly couldn’t be saddled with Sara. Kat might only be informally acting as chief of the Guards, but she knew Salazar’s position was more tenuous still. He was really just a shift supervisor and senior officer. So she’d spoken to him as an equal, suggesting he leave Sara behind in the office to coordinate calls, to give him and his partner Gabe more time to be out on patrol. And he had readily accepted her advice.

  Unsurprisingly, Sara had not leapt with joy, and Kat had last seen her sulking in Tony’s office. Hopefully not getting her way would be good for the girl. But the problem of Sara was only one of many considerations Kat was turning over in her mind as she drifted through the night.

  Trusting her spirit to alert her to any danger she might or might not see as she scanned the shadows in the distance, Kat allowed a corner of her mind to run through all the things she would want to do tomorrow to keep everything functioning smoothly at the Guards. And she prayed Chief Cameron’s recovery was swift, since she didn’t think she’d last much longer in the job. Hopefully they wouldn’t need her to. She also wondered whether or not Michael Salazar was really angling for Tony’s job and speculated on her mother’s motives in running for First Councilor. One thing only Kat refused to think about.

  How long she’d been jogging along deep in that meditation she didn’t know, but when her thoughts surfaced she noticed a small bobbing light through a gap between houses in the distance. Now what was that? She glided across someone’s lawn toward the phenomenon to investigate.

  When she finally rounded the corner of a house to see what it was, what she beheld was both bizarre and unpleasant—a small group of men, seven in all, sneaking noisily through the night. They were muttering among themselves, and one of them carried a torch. An actual burning torch. Where in the world would he have gotten that? The others carried pipes and stones, and one had a broken beer bottle in his hand—the hand that wasn’t carrying the torch. And they shuffled along like they were drunk.

  Kat found herself wondering where people kept getting all that booze, but at least she wouldn’t have to hurt them too badly. She just needed to be careful of the guy with the torch. The last thing anyone needed was a fire.

  As she was thinking how she’d save that guy for last, she took a picture of the strange sight with her FURCS pad, then attached the location and sent an alert to Security. Since it was well after midnight, it would be Kirkland on duty as supervisor rather than Salazar. But by t
he time he or whoever he sent had shown up, Kat hoped to have left them with nothing to do but clean up behind her.

  Not wanting to startle the drunk and disorderly, Kat refrained from bursting forth from the shadows. Instead she sauntered out as if she were on a casual stroll. “Excuse me, guys. I don’t suppose you could tell me where you’re headed?”

  They had already stopped and started to turn as she approached them—now they peered at her with great effort of concentration. She was wearing civilian clothes, of course, and stayed partly in the shadows in hopes they wouldn’t recognize her. Probably they were too intoxicated to identify anyone, but the one with the torch waved it around in her direction as if he were trying to place her.

  Another one stepped forward as spokesman. “If you’re coming, bring a weapon. The director’s been hiding out, but we mean to get some answers even if we have to burn his house down to get them.”

  Kat cocked her head at them. “Answers to what questions?” They clearly didn’t think her father was sick, or know he was in the clinic, and she wasn’t going to enlighten them. The sisters didn’t need to be descended upon by a drunken mob. But then Caroline would also be annoyed if her beauty sleep were disturbed by this lot.

  “Questions?” Even their more lucid leader was confused by this and took a step closer, half-raising the piece of steel pipe in his hand. “I want answers, not questions. Where are our sandwiches? Who do I see about a birthday cake for my little girl?”

  Kat sighed in sympathy. They weren’t bad people, they just didn’t know what to do—though it certainly shouldn’t have been getting blotto. “I’m sure your daughter just wants to know you love her, and there have to be a hundred ways you could show her that.” Some of which wouldn’t involve cake.

  But these men weren’t capable of hearing her or being reasonable right now. She would have to stop them before their behavior deteriorated further and they did something they’d really regret.