It almost felt like Lenore wanted to keep the ground uncertain around Anna.
Fortunately, there were far more important – and fascinating – issues to ponder.
Anna spent ten minutes making her own calls, securing a rare Democrat ex-Governor and a retired humanitarian NGO director who would head into the office now. At the same time, she checked the news sites on her private social media feed, but they offered no hint of a wider disturbance out in the world. It helped that she knew nobody in Springfield. Her brother had freshly uploaded another video of his baby from Berlin, and Anna felt a fresh pang of guilt at no forthcoming visits from
“Aunty Anna” any time soon. She checked in with a few of her private messages, but left the latest one from her mother unanswered, as she did more often of late.
Demien finally finished the Giles Freeman video report and Anna uploaded it to the Gazette’s landing page. He also told her two more experts were on their way in for the panel discussion.
“Great,” she said, checking the time only ten minutes before the conference was due to start. “You might want to go wash your face to wake up a little. I know I could do with another coffee.”
“Wake up?” Demien replied. “Why?”
Anna chuckled.
“We need someone to chair the discussion.”
“Me?”
“You’re a reporter, right?”
Demien’s frozen response was disconcerting, but her desk phone rang with Melina on the other line. Serik Iskov put his head in through the doorway as well, merely looking at her expectantly once he saw she was already tied up.
“I don’t have your number,” Melina said. “Are we ready to hook up?”
“Hook up?”
Anna almost giggled, then frowned at herself. It’d been a long day, and the fatigue ebbed and waned, along with her concentration.
“We’re headed into the control room now,” Anna said at last. “Call you from there.”
Iskov nodded as Anna hung up, hands on the edge of the wide open doorway.
“Ready?” he asked low key. “Ms Barrett’s waiting.”
Anna glanced back at the other vacant desks and nodded slowly as Demien Christopher hurried past, headed for the restroom buttoning on a tie.
LENORE AND ANNA took seats on the settee running along the back of the control booth, with Iskov up at the monitors on a stool. Lenore already had Douglas O’Dowd on the landline phone built into armrest at the halfway point of the seating.
Iskov brought up the view from Melina’s camera, which showed O’Dowd in a suit jacket with his cell to one ear. He realized they were live and started addressing the camera as Melina fussed off-screen. Anna had a second’s disorientation of her own, marveling at how far – and how efficient – newsrooms had become since she first entered the business ten years before.
“You getting this nice and clear?” O’Dowd asked.
Reporters and a pair of camerawomen from TV networks moved around directly behind him, momentarily shielding the view of a wide lectern with the State and national flags behind it. A geeky-looking guy in a skinny black tie fussed with twin microphones at the podium.
“You’re on speaker,” Lenore told him, though actually his voice came through Iskov’s console.
“OK.”
“Douglas,” Anna said. “Do you have a headphone or an ear-piece for your phone?”
“No, but Melina has one.”
Melina briefly appeared, waved shyly to the camera, and handed her companion a pair of white iPhone buds. O’Dowd quickly made the transition, phone in his pocket, just one bud in his ear. He shucked off his jacket, rearranged the headphones so they went over his back, then pulled the jacket back on over his broad-shouldered, thick-middled frame.
“Looking good, Doug,” Lenore said.
The bullish man glanced at the camera.
“Sure I don’t need make-up, Lenore?”
“I’ll lend you some,” Lenore said. “For next time.”
O’Dowd muttered, breaking eye contact with the LD1, then said more clearly, “I wouldn’t expect there to be a next time, any time soon.”
Anna and Lenore glanced at each other, and the editor only laughed.
She pressed a button in her console to mute them, and Anna checked in with Iskov to start the wireless video stream direct to the Gazette’s landing page.
“Just tell me Gus has managed to get a sponsor to help pay for all this,”
Lenore muttered, then glanced to Anna for confirmation as she unmuted the phone again.
“OK, Doug, we’re going live,” she told him. “Remember, no cursing.”
O’Dowd only chuckled darkly, tugged his jacket into place, and straightened – transforming at once into a consummate professional.
DESPITE THE ANGLO name, Mayor Nick Hocking looked like a Hispanic Bradley Cooper, so it was no surprise he’d won by popular vote at the last turn. But the handsome, sallow-looking forty-something wore a dour mood and was dressed to match as he fronted the lead mic flanked by a row of senior police and firefighters and several other men and women in suits with less obvious designations.
“Thank you for your time,” the Mayor said quietly, almost in the manner of a lounge singer preparing for his next song. “I know you all want answers quickly, so I’m going to hand over to Special Agent In-Charge Anthony Westaway from the FBI to give an overview. I’ll talk to the City’s position after that.”
Hocking backed away, and the typical white retired college footballer-type in a blue suit moved to take over, but at the last moment Mr Mayor remembered something and veered back to the podium.
“Please, if I ask you … Please leave all your questions to the end,” he said.
“Thank you. I’ll be back.”
He nodded to the FBI agent who now took the stand.
Sitting in the Gazette’s control booth watching the images spellbound, Anna and Lenore Barrett swapped a surprised look at the city’s head FBI agent addressing the media pack rather than the Chief of Police.
“Ladies and gentlemen of the media,” Agent Westaway said. “My fellow Americans … The FBI has moved to investigate the cause of widespread incidences of crime and violence in Springfield overnight, which I can confirm has spread to nearby cities here in Illinois and our neighbors in Iowa.”
The agent changed position and held both palms out level to the cameras.
“First things first, we’re asking everyone in these areas to immediately refrain from consuming any public drinking water,” Westaway said. “That means bottled water only. Boiling water to drink is also not recommended. I repeat: not recommended.”
He addressed the cameras even more sincerely now.
“Our investigation has just commenced,” he said. “The City is overseeing the police, fire and emergency services response, as they should. It is potentially likely that a foreign chemical agent of some sort may have been distributed through the city’s water supply, or by other, as yet unknown means. Drinking bottled water only is a precautionary measure. So far, these are not widespread incidents. The majority of the city remains under control, and as far as we understand from our friends in Davenport, in Iowa City, Columbia, Peoria –”
The LD1 picked up two nearby reporters closest to the camera’s remote mic.
“Wait, did he just say Columbia?” a woman asked.
“That’s Missouri, for fuck’s sake.”
“– Bloomington, and Champaign –”
“Agent Westaway,” a fierce-looking young blonde called out. “If it’s the water supply, how does that explain cities in Iowa –”
“Jude,” the Mayor said as he stepped and took over the mounted mic. “I asked you to kindly keep your questions to the end. Thank you.”
He motioned for the agent to resume, but ironically that was about all he needed to say, and there was a clear appetite among the reporters to hear the City’s comment on the unfolding nightmare scenario.
“What Special Agent In-
Charge Westaway was saying is that the reports we’re getting back from our neighbors is only sporadic incidents,” the Mayor said calmly.
“Make no mistake, they are serious incidents, and our thoughts and prayers are with those citizens. The … the violence that Springfield has seen overnight is unprecedented. We acknowledge that.”
Hocking paused a moment, re-angling on the mic
“The Governor is on his way for an urgent briefing as we speak, and the –”
“What about the National Guard?”
It was O’Dowd who called out. The Mayor favored him with a gray look, and maybe because of some history between them, gave something approximating an answer.
“Make no mistake,” Hocking said with a clear subtext to O’Dowd. “We’ve called up every single police officer, firefighter, emergency services worker, every nurse, paramedic, registered doctor we have available. We’ve called personnel who are on leave requesting they present for emergency duty. Police Chief Hedstrom sends his apologies for not attending tonight’s conference, but that’s where our priorities lie.
We need every single pair of boots on the street. But because of that, our City’s police have control of those streets. There’s no other … civil unrest … and we are nowhere near the point where we need the National Guard.”
“Mr Mayor!”
An older reporter with a deep burgundy rinse lifted her cell phone at the Mayor as if in salute. Then, pushing back her glasses, she appeared to read from a text.
“I have a contact at Memorial Hospital saying patients brought in with injuries today are attacking nurses and doctors. My source believes there have been fatalities.”
The claim sent a buzz through the media horde and the beleaguered-looking Mayor tried to settle them so he could speak again. For a long moment, that didn’t look likely, and Anna opened the metrics feed on her iPad, slaved to her idle desktop PC, and blinked as the numbers refreshed.
“I thought we were going to hear about some kind of … crime spree,” Anna said to Lenore and coughed a laugh. “We’re talking a three-State area incident. The TVs are all airing this live, right?”
“All four local channels are all live with the broadcast,” Iskov said from the control desk and gave her a mutedly curious look.
“Anyone else?”
Iskov shrugged. Lenore wasn’t any help either.
“No one else in Springfield,” the technician said.
“Who else would there be?” Lenore asked. “Apart from us, of course.”
“I just wanted to check,” Anna said, “because these numbers are through the roof.”
She held out the iPad so Lenore could see, though apart from impressive figures – more than three-hundred thousand people watching the Gazette’s broadcast live – it was clearly written in Greek, as far as Barrett was concerned. Anna took the device back and changed toggles, summoning an infographic confirming what she suspected.
When she switched back to the channel views, the number had risen another fifty thousand viewers.
“People are landing on our site from all over the US, as well as countries all around the world,” Anna said.
She couldn’t dispel the utter shock from her voice.
The viewership number refreshed to show the audience blow past four-hundred thousand.
The door to the outside corridor opened and Demien Christopher stepped in.
He shut the studio door quietly as Nick Hocking kept addressing the reporters.
“We have nearly a million page views on the Giles Freeman piece,” Demien said. “And also … more than ten thousand shares on social media feeds.”
Demien’s shell-shocked expression matched Anna’s own, except he didn’t join her when she started laughing wildly.
“Holy shit,” Anna said. “This is exactly what we needed.”
In her enthusiasm, she didn’t note Lenore’s frown. Instead, she looked back to the science reporter, noticing for the first time a newly-bought corduroy jacket.
“Have any of our panel guests arrived yet?”
“Irene’s gone home,” Demien said in a stilted tone. “What are we doing about the phones? The immunologist, Dr Akanabe, he’s here.”
Hocking barked at the conference reporters once again. Demien’s eyes drifted to the conference stream.
“Don’t they think it’s a disease, rather than the water?” he asked.
Anna looked back at the screen as well. Mayor Hocking shot down more interjections, and Anna said, “I don’t think they really know.”
NICK HOCKING GOT the press conference back under control, but by the time he opened the floor to actual questions from journalists, the bulk of the questions had already come and gone. Captured by the LD1, Douglas O’Dowd again managed to snag the floor by speaking over his competitors.
“Mr Mayor,” he started. “If there’s concerns around the City’s water supply, are you able to tell us why this warning wasn’t given much earlier in the day? Surely almost everyone in Springfield’s been potentially exposed by now.”
It was a good question. The other reporters welcomed it in their usual way, breaking into a smattering of grunts and whispered comments, forcing the Mayor to tamp down the small talk to reply.
“Make no mistake, Mr O’Dowd,” Nick Hocking said again. “We take this incident … this series of incidents … very, very seriously. The FBI has commission of the investigation and Homeland Security as well as the CDC and other agencies are en route. But you have to understand … the painful truth is we just don’t know what we’re dealing with yet.”
He lifted his hands to break through yet more hubbub at the admission.
“Fears around the City’s water supply might prove unfounded,” the Mayor said. “It’s a precautionary step, which if proven right, I’m sure everyone will be glad to have followed. But this is … this is still a developing story, you might say.”
The Mayor cast his powerful dark-eyed gaze over the congregation of reporters and the various City Hall staffers still on-shift to witness proceedings firsthand.
“The past twenty-four hours are unprecedented in Springfield’s history,” he said. “It’s the nature of disaster management that we take the best steps possible – but we’re casting a pretty wide net here.”
“If it’s a natural disaster,” Douglas tried to interject, “why isn’t the National Guard –”
“It doesn’t mean we do not have control of the situation,” Hocking said. “I trust I don’t have to repeat everything I’ve already said. Please avoid public drinking water, keep checking the City website for updates, and otherwise go about your ordinary business. If this is an … intervention, an attack, by enemies of freedom – and no one has come forward to claim responsibility yet – we cannot give them the satisfaction of harming our enviable way of life.”
Hocking was clearly finishing up.
“I ask every citizen here in Springfield and across the State to please take care and avoid adding to the current crisis in any way,” he said. “We will give another update here at 9am tomorrow morning. Thank you all and goodnight.”
The media started to disperse at once. Try as she might, Anna couldn’t stop thinking about her shortcuts today, not even leaving the office after her catch-up with Tom, and drinking water from the glasses in the women’s restroom, provided because the Gazette removed its water cooler during the studio fit-out. Despite the clamor of her own inner voices, Anna used her iPad quickly to post a graphic to play on the site and their social media feeds, now the conference was done, directing viewers to stay online for Demien Christopher’s upcoming panel discussion of “Springfield in Crisis”. She considered adding a blood spatter effect to really make the banner pop, but good graphics weren’t always good taste. And then she remembered the iPhone footage ending in a teenage girl’s screams drowned out by blood, and she shivered.
Beside her, Lenore wore a grief-stricken look.
“Should that be ‘Springfield’ in crisis, or Illino
is?” the editor said.
“Are you OK?” Anna asked.
Anna switched back to the website and social media metrics and boggled for another moment despite her question. Although numbers were dropping away with the end of the live stream, their record high audience was just shy of a million viewers. About a tenth of the numbers were linked to IP addresses in Britain, Europe and Scandinavia, with random connections throughout the rest of the world.
“I know I said earlier on we should ask about the water supply,” Lenore said grimly. “That doesn’t mean I haven’t drunk it myself.”
“Yeah,” Anna said. “Me too.”
“But we’re OK, right?” the editor asked her, completely unsure. “Are you feeling OK?”
“Yeah,” Anna said. “Tired and … you know, first day on the job and all this happens… .”
“Yes,” Lenore said without further comment.
“Audience numbers are … incredible.”
The conference feed on Iskov’s studio monitors switched to the graphic Anna had just sent up, and she glanced at it guilty, briefly making eye contact with the technician.
“I know this isn’t … good news.”
“No,” Lenore said. “But you’re right. It’s news.”
She motioned through the glass windows, Demien Christopher guiding two men and a woman into the studio.
“Putting Demien to work on the panel was a great idea,” Lenore said.
“It seemed like the obvious play.”
“Yep,” Lenore agreed. “But like you said, it’s a long day – and it’ll roll on tomorrow. I want you to wrap up soon, OK?”
Politely, Anna asked, “What do you mean exactly by ‘wrap up’?”
“Go home. From work.”
“But the City… .”
“Yeah,” the editor said. “Just to remind you, it’s the newspaper bringing in the bulk of our revenue right now. Mr Casabian isn’t subsidizing that.”
“I understand,” Anna said. “Still, this is an incredible opportunity –”
“I’m going to need you tomorrow, Anna,” Lenore said seriously. “I need you fresh and awake, got it? We all have to sleep. And eat.”
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