The Mayor of Austin's workday never quite ends. He wakes up in the morning and heads into his office (unless he wakes up on the armchair already in his office) and most nights he works until his glasses can't even help his tired eyes. Balancing the flow of the Capitol's resources is his biggest challenge, and it typically requires long hours of attempting to anticipate deficits as if he can see into the future. He cannot, but sometimes he wonders if this work will drive him mad enough to believe he can.
Tonight is another late night, and the job ahead of him isn't a pleasant one. He doesn't prefer to be the bearer of bad news. That's why he's enlisted the help of his right-hand man, Council President Thomas Lansing, who happens to be much more adept at sugarcoating unpleasantries. Thomas is the one who fetches the two officers from the hall outside his door and guides them into the handsome oak-paneled office.
The Mayor stands when they enter, taking off his glasses and smiling as pleasantly as the occasion allows. His desk is cluttered with stacks of folders and charts and a map of Austin that is marked with dozens of small symbols and dashed lines. Sitting atop it all is a gleaming gold nameplate, inscribed:
Reeves L. Olinger Mayor of Austin
"Good evening, Lieutenant O'Brien, Commander Avery," the Mayor begins, moving out from behind his desk to gesture the two men towards a sitting area with several armchairs and a low coffee table. "Please, take a seat. Would either of you like some tea? I'll get some tea." He doesn't wait for an answer from either of the officers, instead pouring already-steaming water from an electronic kettle into a set of chipped mugs. He hands his guests mugs of a strange swamp-green tea that smells rather alarmingly like dirt and old cabbage. He sips on his own cup as if he finds it a truly delightful brew, taking his seat across from Archer and O'Brien.
"I'm sorry to call you in so late," he says between sips of his swamp cabbage sludge. "But Mr. Lansing has just brought me the most tragic news. Would you, Thomas?"
Moving forward from the Mayor's right hand side, Thomas nods. He's a handsome man in his early thirties in a rather impeccable suit, with dark hair and a face that normally walks a line somewhere between professional and amused at some secret joke. Right now, however, he looks appropriately sober for tragic news.
"Don't feel pressured to drink the mud," he says, like a small since-we're-all-friends-here preamble, with rather a fond look at the mayor. "I tell him all the time it's terrible." Then he lifts his hands, palms up, and it's clear they are switching gears. He looks first to Archer, and then to O'Brien, and if he has anything but a good opinion of either of them it doesn't show in his eye contact. "I'll just get on with it. You'll both have noticed the absence of Chief Grady and Deputy Chief Roccolini. It appears the Chief became infected with the virus while outside of the Capitol, and took the Deputy Chief down as well, some time earlier this week."