Ms. Reynolds Dilemma II

Sam was found in the official building that had been set aside as a police department for the city. It was a volunteer police department of course, this being Ferndale, but it had been decided that they deserved their own building. The people who broke the few laws Ferndale had were kept here, and trials were now held in the building rather then the Town Hall. Sam’s real title was General, not the chief of police, but wars were far and few between. Ferndale didn’t have a standing army so there was no need for Sam in his capacity as General. Because he wasn’t always needed in the military Ferndale had made him in charge of the police force as well, so he was employed full time. Sam was paid through donations from citizens which seemed a lot like bribery to Ms. Reynolds but Sam had so far not allowed it to affect his judgment, so far as she knew.

“Hello Ms. Reynolds,” Sam said in his usual quiet voice. He had a stutter still but it wasn’t as bad as it had been, even back when Ms. Reynolds had first come to the city. The doctor had been working with Sam and whatever it was he had been doing seemed to work.

“Hello Sam, had any trouble? I’ve heard some people getting noisy about gaining independence again,” Ms. Reynolds got straight to the point. That train of conversation had worked on the rulers so she figured it would work on Sam as well.

“Nothing against the law yet,” Sam told her. Ms. Reynolds sat on the other side of the desk.

“What do you think of the whole independence movement yourself?” Ms. Reynolds asked and watched as Sam put his thoughts together. He wasn’t the sort of person to talk without thinking; he wasn’t the sort to do anything without thinking for that matter. He managed to outsmart his opponents both as police chief and general, which was good because he had no physical strength to speak of.

“I think we lack the strength to defend ourselves from the underground cities if they don’t like it when we declare independence. It is dangerous to assume that they will take our announcement peacefully and we aren’t prepared for war on that scale.”

“What if something forced your hand, to make a decision, like if you were told that everyone in the school had to leave? Would you leave?” Sam gave her a very pointed look, Ms. Reynolds knew he was smart, he knew she was fishing for something. Of course he didn’t have the knowledge to know what she was fishing for but that didn’t change that he was suspicious. He gave her an answer anyway though.

“If everyone else left I would leave, I won’t be here by myself.”

“And if everyone else stayed?” Ms. Reynolds asked, though she knew the answer already.

“I would stay; this city will always need a General, and the law. I said I would serve as both and I will until I stop doing a good job, and then I will quit.” Ms. Reynolds nodded. Sam wasn’t an unreasonable person but he was still loyal to Ferndale, just like all of the leaders, there wasn’t one of the leaders who didn’t put the city before themselves. Ms. Reynolds was letting it sink home that this loyalty would lead them to plunge into war to allow the city to continue. Still, there was John left to talk to, he might be Tom’s underling but he was still politically strong and therefore mattered in her survey.

John was at home, he wasn’t working, there was nothing for him to do while in Ferndale. Ferndale was where the spies rested or waited for orders in between jobs. Ms. Reynolds found John with Kerma’s cat attached to his hand, with its teeth; Kerma’s cat was infamously vicious.

“It came over looking for food and it decided that my hand looked tasty. Help me get it off will you? I don’t want to hurt it,” John said, shaking his hand gently in an attempt to loosen the feline. Ms. Reynolds had no love for the cat and didn’t see why hurting it a little would be such a bad thing if it would stop it from savaging people but she gently pried it off of John’s hand anyway.

“He drew blood,” John complained, searching a draw for a bandage. “There’s a slice of meat in the icebox that is starting to go bad, you can feed him that.”

“You’re going to feed it after it bit you?” Ms. Reynolds asked in amazement. If it was her she would have booted it from her house instantly, and banned it permanently from the premises.

“I always feed it,” John said shrugging. “So what were you visiting for?”

“I was just thinking, since you’re a spy, have you heard anything about the local independence from the school movement? They seem to be getting excited again and I’m worried about trouble.”

“We don’t spy on our own city,” John snapped. That wasn’t entirely true but they couldn’t let it get around or the spies knew they would be outcasts in their own city. No one liked dealing with a spy when they knew they were among the ones being spied on.

“I wasn’t accusing, I was just saying that you more connected to people here in the city then I am, they don’t talk to me easily. The spies are popular so I thought maybe people had said something to you,” Ms. Reynolds said, quickly reassuring to him.

“Well I haven’t, not anything that hasn’t be around since before you came here. Been what, two years now?” John asked, as if he was only just realizing how long it had been.

“About,” Ms. Reynolds admitted. “So you haven’t heard anything? What do you think? Are you on the side of Ferndale leaving the school to be an independent city?”

“Not something I want to talk about with a school official, no offense Ms. Reynolds. You’re nice and all but I don’t want to talk about anything that could get me in big trouble if it came to the wrong ears.”

“So you wouldn’t commit to a side, no matter what? Is that what you are saying? Even in an extreme situation?”

“What kind of extreme situation are we talking about here?” John asked. John wasn’t one of the more cautious spies but not one spy would willingly admit to anything that could be considered condemning at a future date. Not to an official anyway, though the bar was often filled with stories of their exploits.

“What if the school was shut down and everyone was asked to leave? What would you do then?”

“It hasn’t happened yet,” John said carefully but Ms. Reynolds could tell by his face that he wasn’t telling the truth. He would fight if anyone tried to take him from Ferndale and that wasn’t a good thing. If John would fight then so would the rest of the spies and if the spies fought then the underground army might have a very hard time. Of course that was assuming that the underground cities would attack them if they disobeyed orders, but the underground cities usually attacked first and asked questions later.

Ms. Reynolds left John’s house and headed back home, she figured she’d asked enough people to know the general feeling of the city and it wasn’t what she had hoped. She had hoped that maybe they would say that they would go along with the underground cities, that they wouldn’t fight against their parents and cousins who lived there. Instead every leader had given off the feeling that if it came to it they would be willing to fight to the death. That left a new doubt in her mind, she could either tell them to go back to the underground cities and fight and possibly die for them. It was either that or she could let them declare independence and run the risk that they would be attacked for declaring their freedom. That would lead to their fighting and dying as well. Either way things looked bad.

When she got back to her house she was shocked to find Tom there. She had been positive that he was out of town but of course he came and went as he liked. He didn’t often visit her though, especially not as one of his first visits when he was back in town. They hadn’t started out on the right foot and while things had mended between them slightly he had still made it very clear that she was to keep out of his business. He didn’t say anything while she opened the door but as soon as she had it open he slipped in without waiting for her invitation. Then he looked expectantly at the door until she closed it.

“I suppose you got a letter from the school too, saying they are shutting down the school,” he said right off.

“How do you know about that?” Ms. Reynolds demanded. She should have known better then to ask.

“Found the letter on the desk of one of the teachers in Pleasant Valley. He was dead drunk and who can blame him when he’s in charge of a city run by bandits. It made it very easy to look through his papers though. I supposed that all of the teachers got a copy of the letter and that means you as well.”

“I got a letter, probably the same one you saw,” Ms. Reynolds admitted.

“Have you told anyone about it?” Tom demanded.

“No one except the doctor, why?”

“I don’t want you to tell them, the school probably won’t remember we exist so there’s no reason to bother them, got it?” there was a note of threat in Tom’s voice.

“Aren’t you making a dangerous decision? They could attack if you don’t evacuate.”

“It’s better then you trying to make a decision about it, I bet you were too. This isn’t any of your business alright? You leave this to the people who are actually in charge of this city,” Tom said, Ms. Reynolds guessed she had thought that their relationship had healed more then it had.

“That would be Frendral and Kerma and I don’t see them here,” Ms. Reynolds told Tom, just as angry with him for his arrogance. “It’s a letter I got and who I share it with is my business.”

“Just leave it be, please,” Tom said, changing his tone suddenly. “It’s our decision to make, let us decide our fate.” When he put it like that, Ms. Reynolds no longer had a choice.