V-Wars

At first, Mia was annoyed that he chose Jack first, but then she realized she had no idea what to ask. All the questions she had prepared in her head were based on what she thought this presser might be about. Big Charlie being the latest victim of I1V1 never made that particular list.

“So just to verify — you are continuing to seek re-election?”

A dumb but necessary question, to which Big Charlie replied, “Of course. Nothing of consequence has changed. One more question. Mia?”

And just like that, she knew what she had to ask. “If you have full control over the transformation as you say, Mr. District Attorney — then why reveal the condition at all?”

Jack stared down at her with a look approaching respect.

“Thank you for asking that, Mia,” Big Charlie said, and he sounded sincere. Mia couldn’t help but put on a self-satisfied smile. “I have been a part of this community for my entire life. Except for my brief sojourn in Brooklyn, I have always been a child of the Bronx. I have never lied to the people of this borough, Mia, and I see no reason to start now. Some might say I have everything to lose by sharing this information, but what, pray tell, is the alternative? Yes, I could hide it — and then what? What if Mr. Solano or an enterprising defense attorney learns the truth and reveals it? I would no longer be able to do my job — more to the point, I would no longer be worthy to do my job. The truth is, the only way I lose is if I do not disclose this condition.”

Mia jotted down a few more notes. She was witnessing political history here.

“There are men and women all across the globe who are being persecuted for what is truly only a medical condition. I am continuing with my life to show others that they can continue with theirs. Thank you all, my friends.”

More voices blurted out with questions, but Big Charlie had left the podium, and a slightly-less-sour-looking Judy had returned. “Thanks, everyone, I’m sorry, but no more questions. No more questions!”

“Oh, there’ll be more questions, you can bet the house on that,” Jack said.

— 5 —

Judy Alejo had deliberately timed the call to her older sister for five minutes before Top of the News with Helen Lashmar started so she would only have to talk to her for five minutes. It meant Perla had to concentrate her questions about when Judy would get a boyfriend, start going to church again, and stop doing that awful job and do something useful.

“Look, I have to go,” Judy said in Spanish when the closing credits for the morning talk show that was just finishing on RSN rolled.

“You always have to go so fast,” Perla replied in the same language.

“I’m the press secretary for a district attorney running for reelection. It’s busy now. It’ll get better after the primary.”

Barel walked into the office just then. The older woman was wearing yet another cardigan, despite summer coming around. She seemed to have an endless supply of them.

“You always say that, Judy, but —”

“I really do have to go.”

“But —”

Judy pulled the phone from her ear and hit end. She turned to Barel and said, “That woman will drive me up a —”

“How’s that again?”

Shaking her head, Judy realized she was talking to Barel in Spanish. Switching to English, she said, “Nothing. Let’s see how this goes.”

She’d been dreading this broadcast. The first story Lashmar would be tackling was Big Charlie, and her producers had assembled an impressive cross-section of pundits to pick the whole thing apart.

“Some good news,” Barel said. “Judy Gomez cancelled, so they got Mia Fitzsimmons on.”

Judy’s eyes widened. Mia had been a godsend, giving them excellent coverage. More to the point, hers was the only coverage that had been about Big Charlie as a person rather than a cause or a thing. Of course, she’d been the only one paying attention to him prior to that, as a local D.A. election wasn’t any great shakes. Now, though, everyone was on the story and everyone had an opinion — but very little of it had to do with Hugues Charles himself.

The opening music finished, and the camera cut to Lashmar — an attractive brunette in her thirties who looked great on camera and had done a superb job of never once having any kind of opinion. That combined with her strong interviewing skills enabled her to get really good guests on her show.

“Good morning,” she said in her pleasant alto. “We start with our roundtable segment, where a panel will tackle the news of the day. Joining me today are John Generico of the Generico Politico blog, Mia Fitzsimmons of the New York Daily News, former Manhattan District Attorney and current columnist for Newsweek Allen Reimold, and the Rev. Michael Sookdeo, chair of the Religious Studies Department at St. Paul’s College.”

Judy frowned. “Religious Studies? What the hell?”

Barel shrugged. “The religious types’ve been coming out of the damn woodwork. Vampires, crosses …”

“Our first story,” Lashmar said, “is from New York City. Patient Zero of I1V1 came from New York, and now the first politician to publicly admit to suffering from the virus has come out of the city as well. Bronx District Attorney Hugues Charles, known locally as ‘Big Charlie,’ has admitted to being a werewolf. We’ll start with John — what do you think this means for Big Charlie’s re-election chances?”

Judy noticed that Mia looked relieved that she didn’t get the first question.

Not that she herself was all that thrilled with Generico getting it. He was either a textbook example of the triumph of Internet journalism, or proof that the Internet had destroyed journalism, depending on who you asked. Judy generally fell into the former camp, but Generico’s bloviating blog was the exception in her mind.

He also had the proverbial face made for radio, as his wide mouth, twitchy gestures, and beady eyes meant he was better suited to carrying on where you didn’t have to look at him. That didn’t stop every cable news station from having him on since his blog passed a billion hits a week.

In response to the question, Generico said, “In the toilet. Seriously, did he think this would have any result other than total disaster? These people are being hunted down and shot — the ones who aren’t hunting themselves. Plus, how do we know he isn’t going around mangling people on the night of the full moon?”

Judy shook her head. “Here we go.” The past few weeks had forced her to take a crash course in separating the wheat from the chaff of werewolf legends, but most people didn’t go to that much effort, and just fell back on the obvious pop-culture stereotypes just as Generico was doing.

Mia spoke up. “Well, for starters, he has control over the transformation, and — ”

Generico interrupted her. “We only have his word for that.”

“We only have his word that he has the virus! And he didn’t have any reason to tell anyone.”

Dismissing her with one of his twitchy gestures, Generico looked at Lashmar. “He wasn’t even sure he was going to enter the race. Now he’s got cold feet, so he’s admitting to the problem that probably led to his delay in entering the race in the first place. He probably just figured he’d have no opposition, then when Solano decided to run, he needed a reason to back out.”

Judy’s first job was in the mayor’s office, and she’d met Allen Reimold when he was the Manhattan D.A. She’d always liked him — certainly more than the jackass who had the job these days — and so she was cheered to hear him run to Big Charlie’s defense. “Except he isn’t backing out. If he was, he would have by now. In fact, he’s increased his public appearances in the three days since the announcement.”

Generico shook his head. “I still think it’s butt-covering. He’s been pretty popular, so he doesn’t want to let the community down.”

“He’s not just ‘popular,’ ” Reimold said, “he’s good.He’s streamlined the D.A.’s office, reducing the average time between arrest and trial by months. Now part of it’s the lower crime rate. I tried to do what he did when I was in the Manhattan office, but I couldn’t get it done because there was just too much backlog. But he’s taken advantage of that to really do some good.”

Barel was nodding. “Nice.” The campaign manager had been bitching for days about this show, that it was going to be a hatchet job, especially with Generico on there, and Judy hadn’t been able to assuage her concerns.

Mia then joined in. “I think it’s also important to recognize that he’s doing something politicians almost never do: he’s telling the truth.”

Generico made a noise. “You think maybe there’s a reason why they never do that? When they do, they fail.”

“Actually, John, no, it’s when they lie and get caught that they fail. We live in an age of a twenty-four-hour news cycle. Politicians — even local D.A.s — have reporters who follow their every move. Hell, I’ve been covering Big Charlie since he announced. With that kind of coverage, it gets impossible to have a secret life. End result, the bad stuff comes out. That’s what killed Eliot Spitzer’s career, just to give a recent local example.”

Judy winced. Her mentor in the business worked for Spitzer’s gubernatorial campaign and had really believed in him. The day the New York governor’s career was torpedoed by a sex scandal, Judy had had to listen to a two-hour harangue over the phone over how you think you know somebody …

“I don’t know about that, Mia,” Reimold said. “I mean, you’re right about Spitzer, but history is filled with examples of politicians who kept important health secrets from the public.”

Barel snorted. “Generico’s gonna mention either Woodrow Wilson or FDR.”

Judy nodded. Woodrow Wilson had a stroke while in office, and his First Lady wound up doing much of the governing during the latter days of his presidency. Franklin Delano Roosevelt hid the fact that he had polio and was wheelchair bound from the world as he led the country through the second World War.