(A Short Scene)
INT. SPECTACLE
From my desk, the command post didn’t look like a police department. It looked like a zoo. A maze of mismatched desks flickered under fluorescent lights. Whiteboards scrawled with half-erased notes, old case files stacked like leaning towers, and the permanent smell of burnt coffee. I tapped on my keyboard, expression blank, while the circus unfolded around me.
—
ROME: (ex-Marine, desk polished like an altar)
(to no one in particular)
When I was in the Corps, discipline meant everything. You screw up, you’re done. That’s why I don’t screw up.
BRO: (college logos plastered on every surface)
Bro, you already screwed up, bro. Like last week, bro.
ROME:
That wasn’t a screw-up. That was tactical misdirection.
BRO:
Brooo, the captain called it a screw-up, bro.
ROME: glared, jaw tight. Bro grinned like he’d just won a championship game no one else was playing.
And me? I kept typing, daydreaming, and taking field notes on the animals of Bridgeview PD.
—
ROGERS: (lieutenant, rhinestone suit, sunglasses indoors)
Gentlemen, please. Some of us are trying to cultivate an image of professionalism.
She adjusts her lapel dramatically, like she’s on a runway instead of in a division.
—
LANDRY: (leaning back, puffing on a vape like it’s a life support machine)
Hoss got her neck broken undercover. Savage was there. Everyone knows.
The room falls silent. They all look at her. Some departments had detectives. Bridgeview had animals on parade.
—
BRO:
Bro, that’s wild, bro.
ROME:
That’s classified.
ROGERS:
Hoss never knew how to accessorize anyway.
—
Suddenly, SLOANE (Rome’s protégé, loud, eager, desperate for attention) bursts in. He’s carrying a stack of files he clearly hasn’t read.
SLOANE:
(booming)
Good morning, everyone! Just closed another case.
SARAH: (without looking up)
Which one?
SLOANE:
Uh— the one with… the thing. You know. The fraud thing.
ROME:
That was mine.
BRO:
Bro, you didn’t even leave your desk, bro.
SLOANE:
Hey, hey. Doesn’t matter who gets credit. We’re a team. (beat) But it was me. Definitely me.
—
The noise level rises: everyone talking over each other, voices overlapping into static. ROME barking Marine jargon, BRO repeating “bro” endlessly, ROGERS commenting on her wardrobe, LANDRY name-dropping everyone from Midtown Central, SLOANE shouting for validation.
—
CUT TO: SARAH SMITH
Deadpan. Still typing. She doesn’t even flinch.
—
NARRATOR: (SARAH’S INNER VOICE)
Welcome to the zoo. I feed the animals paperwork and coffee. They feed themselves on their own stupidity.
Smith hits “print.”
FADE OUT.
