(c) Friday, July 13, 2012
“Breaking news: we reported there is a huge crowd assembling outside the nation’s Capitol. It was believed in these earlier reports that the thousands gathering outside the Capitol were related to the cancelled ceremonies. Perhaps people with plans to participate, and others not realizing the events were canceled, showing up led others to gather, drawing in more individuals curious to see what everyone was gathering for. But now URNBR has confirmed that this is a violent mob assembling before the Capitol’s West Front.”
“Zombies! Zombies shuffling together from all compass points surrounding the Capitol building,” played a recording of someone outside the radio station presumably witnessing the events firsthand.
“I would describe it as the Running of the Bulls along Pennsylvania Avenue,” picked up the radio personality, “as the thousands lining that street come off the curb running toward the Capitol. The violent crowd snorting puffs of crystalizing air from their snarling snouts are stomping up the street to stand with the already large crowds of staring zombies standing around the West Front of the Capitol.”
“Thank goodness they are not turning the other way toward the White House,” added the co-host with emphasis.
Outside the Congress thousands of people had seemed to suddenly gather. Still more streamed in from Pennsylvania Avenue. Smaller numbers appeared from every compass point around the Capitol building. The thousands gathering stood with the others assembled outside the West Front until like a school of fish the crowd suddenly darted in lockstep to the left. The people moving from the area before the Capitol’s West Front and the people feeding together with them from Pennsylvania Avenue overflowed the North flank of the Capitol spilling over onto Constitution Avenue. After several minutes, the tail end of the group which had been assembled before the West Front darted off South to the right of the Capitol building. From the air above, media choppers reported two streams of people could be seen moving around the sides of the Capitol from the West side to the East side of the building.
From Union Station, people coming to the Capitol along Delaware Avenue were somehow aware that the West Front crowd was moving to the other side of the Capitol. The long line of people along Delaware Avenue, coming from Union Station toward the Capitol, suddenly cascaded to First Street, correcting course to meet up with the West Front and Pennsylvania Avenue crowds streaming around the Capitol to the East side. Still more people congregating from the Capitol South Metro began joining with the second group of West Front people who had been circling the Capitol from the South.
By the time the two main masses of humanity came around to the East side of the Capitol, there was twenty thousand people filling the area. Various agents of the government, civil law enforcement, military and others scurried hurriedly at the direction of some invisible coordinator along the top of the marble stairs to the West Pediment--the entrance to the United States Supreme Court. The crowds described as zombies by one eyewitness on URNBR talk radio was indeed regrouping at the foot of the Supreme Court on the West Plaza. The scene was eerie with no chants or signs from the crowd; just the sound of stepping feet. As they seemed to wait upon others, the crowd grew within minutes another ten thousand. And still more were coming.
A uniformed officer stepped forward from the line of government agents at the top of the Supreme Court steps and shouted through an amplified megaphone to the ominously quiet crowd burgeoning below.
“Turn back and go home,” he began; then identified some authority for his command, and continued, “You will not be allowed to enter the courthouse.”
The crowd below, now nearing forty thousand strong, began locking arms with each other forming a huge human chain. Those at the very bottom of the staircase to the West Pediment in unison took the first step up the Virginia marble staircase. The crowd behind those who took the first step filled in the space behind them and so on. The government agents armed with pistols, rifles and other firearms made a show of readying their weapons to be fired. In the hush the unmistakable sound of firearms being cocked resounded over the crowd.
“If you do not stop and return to your homes, we will be forced to fire upon you with live ammunition,” was yelled at the front line of the crowd taking a second step up the Supreme Court steps. “Deadly force,” the officer added for emphasis.
One wondered why tear gas or other nonlethal option were not suggested, but perhaps it was the complete unexpected approach of the crowd. Certainly, by the motley crew of government agents assembled at the top of the courthouse steps, one could assume that they were entirely unprepared for this. Contrariwise, how could one believe that the government would prefer to respond so heavy handed against its own people? Even so, the stand off between the forty or so government agents and the now forty thousand people gathering below was set. Not except by airlift could more government agents slip pass the crowd of people surrounding the courthouse arm in arm with each other.
The front line of the crowd stepped again deliberatively, and again, and again. Their steady slow pace was dramatic and single-minded. The agents above aimed their weapons and fired above the advancing crowd. While there were some shrieks, impulsive ducking and a few fainting in the massive burgeoning crowd, the front line kept stepping up and the crowd at large remained arm in arm moving with them. The agents again, in the hush after the echoing gunfire, cocked their weapons. This time their weapons were lowered at the stepping front line only ten feet away.
The front line said nothing but kept walking into the barrels of the guns. Reaching the zenith, the government agents gave way to the crowd that slowly walked pass them to the closed Bronze Doors. At first unable to pass them, but then seemingly let in somehow or by someone, the crowd crushed forward and in to the courthouse. Inside the crowd moved through the halls into rooms in every direction. As rooms were found empty, the people would push back and send the others in other directions, into other rooms.
The shrill screams of a woman were heard above all the footsteps echoing through the marble courthouse. The group of people who came upon the old woman cringing in a finely ornamented room backed away. The old woman kept shrieking over and over unconsolably. The crowd just moved on. More doors were opened, more rooms breached, more stairs climbed.
A group of people opened a door to find a man who lept up from a chair and backed up a step. The group held its position in the doorway. From behind them there was pushing and shoving until to the front was pushed another man from the crowd. The man behind the desk took one step forward and reached his right hand to a side drawer of his desk.
“The crowd has apparently overtaken the Capitol Police by force and rushed into the Supreme Court,” updated the URNBR personality. “The President, who only days ago ‘reluctantly’ as he said was ‘forced,’” adding emphasis, “to suspend the inauguration in response to the dire national emergency, is already with his family in a secure location,” explained the URNBR personality to any listeners of the radio broadcast.
In the chambers of the Supreme Court, the man behind the desk pulled a Bible from the desk drawer. The man entering the room stepped forward and put his left hand on the Bible and raised his right hand up by his chest palm out.
“Repeat after me,” said the Chief Justice to the other man as a pendulum clock on a mantle snapped its minute hand to 12. The crowd at the door squeezed in and about the room so that more could witness the occasion as the two men before the Bible continued. “. . . [D]o solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute the office,” repeated the President-Elect.
~1,400 words
I liked the ending very much.
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