[locked to Raylan Givens and Jim Kirk]
I am the fourth LaRue. The third is out of control, and I can't stop him without your help. Lance Blackthorn and Percy Weasley will vouch for me, though they will not tell you my identity.
[locked to Percy Weasley]This is Sirius, here -- I am taking over as LaRue. The current LaRue is killing criminals
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But I suppose I ought to introduce myself first...
[and then, he switches to video. He looks stressed, tired, and a bit scared, but more importantly, he looks like Sirius Black. Because he is.]
Hello, Jim.
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And hurt.
But mostly stern.]
What the hell are you thinking, Sirius?
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There's a government organization the police don't know about. That nobody knows about, for the most part, except the people involved. The "secret police." Slate's in charge of us, and our job is to take care of things the police can't handle for whatever reason.
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Goddamn it, Sirius, maybe the police can't handle it because there's a secret organization keeping things from us. That's somehow guiding organized crime.
How long, Sirius? How long have you been part of this, and what part of keeping this from me did you think was all right? Don't you see this is... this undermines everything we're trying to do here?
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And now we're telling you anyway, because it's gone too far. Because it isn't what we signed up for anymore. I don't care what sort of trouble I get into for revealing this.
[he sighs, frustrated] We just need your help.
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Not to mention what it was you signed up for they've gone beyond.
[He sighs.]
It's not like we're going to throw you to the wolves, Sirius.
[Bad phrasing?]
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It helps that Sefton has spent so much time around Lance and has known him for an entire year now. After hearing the man let all this out, he keeps the tone in mind and copies it. ]For the record, secrecy and crime aren’t synonymous. Keeping ourselves secret meant we could get information the police can’t simply because they’re public. I did tell you, Jim, as much as I could, that there were those other than the police with an interest into the criminal underground, others who had a similar interest to the police. If I’d had a say in it the police would have known about it from the start, and as far as I’m concerned that was a mistake. We’re trying to rectify it now, and we’re doing it without the blessing of the man in charge, so... for God’s sake don’t make this personal ( ... )
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The police are public because to have an extra-legal agency valuing ends over means undermines exactly what the law is there for. To protect people. This isn't personal, Lance. It's a basic, fundamental belief I have that society can only be truly equal and free if power is consented to and transparent. I realize Bete Noire is a far cry from my world, where we've gone through our own bad times. But if the police "can't" do something? I think that makes by definition wrong.
[He sighs. That's not the point right now. Nor is whatever boneheaded idea led Sirius to this pass. There is the problem of the resulting power vacuum.]
It's not going to be a utopia. But the closer we can get to having the public believe we're improving things, the better we'll be able to protect them.
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And I'm sorry, Jim, but I'm from a world where the law doesn't protect people. Where the law throws innocent men in prison without a trial. Where we had to use a secret organization to fight the real criminals. Where you can't trust anyone. So yes, when I signed up I thought it was a good idea. But you don't have to tell us it isn't working, we've figured that out.
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Chief, the existence of my whole country is the greatest secret in the history of my planet. We protect ourselves with secrecy, because there are beings and psychics there whose powers would be used for personal gain or warfare by the world at large if they only knew they were there. We’ve never used that secrecy to control what goes on outside the country-just to protect ourselves. So yes, I believe secrecy can be used conscientiously.
Jim, I never disagreed that the police need to know-why do you think we’re here right now? You said to me once that you believe a lot of things believed as sins are just societal. This is one of them. We want the same things you do; we want to protect the people here. We just went about it in a different way, one we hoped would complement yours. Please believe at least that, if nothing else.
[ On this side of the comm, there’s a (fairly inaudible) deep breath and Lance rubbing his face ( ... )
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