seattlejaycees Chapter 365 - 174: Leader
Chapter 365 - 174: Leader
Late at night, in the City Hall communications room.
A giant screen was split into seven smaller panes, displaying seven faces, each with a different expression.
This was an emergency closed-door meeting of the "Pennsylvania Industrial Revival Alliance."
"I’ve read the script Leo gave us."
In the top-left pane of the screen, Joe Byers, the Mayor of Scranton, was the first to break the silence.
"The script is excellent, it really is. The logic is sound, it’s packed with emotion. If this were Hollywood, it could win an Oscar."
Byers gave a bitter smile.
"But who dares to be the first one to act?"
"My constituents have guns in their homes. If I stand on the steps of City Hall tomorrow morning and announce that I, a Republican Mayor, am switching my allegiance to the Democratic Party..."
Byers pointed to his chest.
"The next day, I’d have to wear a bulletproof vest to work. My office would be smashed to pieces by angry constituents, and my car would be covered in paint."
"This isn’t just political suicide. It’s suicide in the physical sense."
The other faces on the screen mirrored his fear.
The Mayor of Johnston said, "That’s right. Warren might be a bastard, but his roots run deep where we are. The churches, the rifle associations, the veterans’ clubs—that’s all his turf."
"If we make a move against him, those conservative groups will eat us alive."
The Mayor of Newcastle also sighed. "Besides, public opinion isn’t exactly on Murphy’s side right now. If we come out and support him, the voters will think we’re insane."
Everyone hesitated.
It was an enormous gamble.
If they won, they would be the heroes who led their cities out of the mire, the trailblazers of a new era.
If they lost, they would be traitors who had betrayed their party and their constituents. They’d be pilloried, and they might not even get to keep their pensions.
Everyone waited for someone else to speak first.
"Ahem."
A cough broke the stalemate.
In the center of the screen, the Mayor of Erie, Ron Smith, who had been silent until now, stubbed out his cigarette in an ashtray.
"I’ll do it."
Smith’s voice was filled with resolve.
The eyes of the other six men instantly focused on him.
"Ron, are you insane?" Byers asked, astonished. "Your district is the reddest of them all."
"That’s exactly why it has to be me who fires the first shot."
Smith lit another cigarette and took a deep drag. The nicotine helped clear his weary mind a little.
His gaze swept across the other six faces on the screen, finally settling on the Mayor of Scranton, Joe Byers.
"Let’s be honest, everyone here knows that the only ones qualified and with enough clout to take a shot at that old bastard Warren are me and Joe."
Byers heard this and instinctively opened his mouth to object, but Smith raised a hand to stop him.
"Joe, don’t be so quick to declare your position. I know you want to say you’d do it too, but I can’t let you walk into a death trap."
Smith flicked the ash from his cigarette, his tone turning calm.
"The situation in Scranton is too complicated. Half of your city council is loyal to Warren, your police chief is counting on funding from the Republican state committee, and your authority is too heavily constrained."
"If you came out tomorrow to announce your defection, Warren would only need to make two phone calls. Your city council would initiate impeachment proceedings, and your police chief would declare that public safety is out of control at this critical juncture. You’d be tripped up by your own people at your office door before you even made it to the podium."
On the other end of the screen, Byers fell silent.
He knew Smith was telling the truth.
"But I’m different."
Smith’s voice grew low, imbued with a confidence built up over many years.
"I’ve run Erie for a full twenty years. I promoted the police chief, the fire chief is my old high school classmate, and even the head of the sanitation workers’ Union owes me three favors. My will flows between every brick and stone in this city."
"I have the capital to absorb the first wave of the attack, and the ability to maintain order and prevent things from collapsing into chaos."
His words caused a subtle shift in the atmosphere of the virtual meeting room.
Their hesitation was now tinged with a new respect for the veteran mayor.
Willingly shouldering risk was a rare quality in politics.
But Smith wasn’t finished.
"And another thing, gentlemen. We need to be clear about this."
Smith leaned forward, closer to the camera.
"Why are we joining this so-called Revival Alliance? For survival, for money. That’s true."
"But don’t forget what that young Leo Wallace is holding. He’s holding five hundred million US Dollars in bonds, the power to distribute contracts, and the pathway to Washington."
"If we just go to him one by one, like a disorganized rabble, pledging our loyalty and begging for scraps, then what does that make us? We’d be nothing but his hired hands, pawns on his chessboard. Who gets more, who gets less—it’d be entirely up to his whim."
"Are you willing to place the fate of your cities entirely in the hands of some thirty-something kid from Pittsburgh?"
The expressions on the other mayors’ faces changed.
"I’m not," Smith answered his own question.
"So, we have to stick together. Within this Revival Alliance, we need to build our own inner circle. We need a voice—one that’s loud enough, carries enough weight, and can sit at the table as an equal with Leo Wallace."
"I’ll be the one to stick my neck out. I’ll take the first wave of Warren’s wrath."