Time-outs for Terrorists

Detective James Breckenridge glared angrily at his coffee as his leads disappeared into the ether around him one by one.

"Darg! There goes another one!" He slammed his fist down on his desk, causing his music to skip and his oscillating fan to oscillate right onto the floor.

"Angry, much?" asked an infuriating man.

"Yes," James replied brusquely. "What gave it away?"

The infuriating man formed himself an annoyingly patronizing little smile, which he applied to his clean-shaven face. "It's hard to make an MP3 player skip. And you've been eating paperclips by the handful. Anything I can help with?"

James doubted it. It kind of depended on what he meant by "help". The rookie was always prancing around the place offering advice and suggesting new ways to solve crimes. The worst part about it all was that his ideas had merit. In fact, the rookie could singlehandedly replace every man woman and K9 unit in the room.

If he wasn't such a whinging little twit, that is.

"No."

The infuriating man seated himself primly on the edge of James' desk. "Oh, come now Jim. I'm sure we can find you some new leads if we work together. I feel that this would be a good opportunity for the two of us to develop some synergy."

"I feel that this would be a good opportunity for you to see if you could stuff yourself down the break room sink."

"Quick! There goes another one! It went under your mouse pad!"

James steadfastly refused to look down at his mousepad. He gritted his teeth and focused all of his hate on the infuriating man's belt buckle. He clenched his fist. He couldn't take it anymore and he yanked the mousepad up by a corner.

"DAMMIT!" Another lead scurried down the side of his desk and disappeared into the ductwork.

"These are bad men who hate America, Jim. We have to find them and deliver swift and pointy justice before they can spread their hatred like the disease it is." The infuriating man was actually saluting his wall calendar. It was July, and there was a picture of an American flag on the top page.

"There are only two of these wackos, and when we raided their apartment, it was obvious that they had been gone for weeks, maybe months. They're probably not even in the country any more. And I say good riddance."

"They might have friends, Jim," the infuriating man said, looking away from his calendar flag briefly to arch an eyebrow at James.

James watched another lead hop off the stack of papers in his inbox.

"Somehow I doubt that. They were planning to bomb the public library because it contained too much knowledge. Not gonna get a whole lot of support for a crusade like that."

The infuriating man wingtipped around behind James' desk and inspected its surface. He slid a picture of Mrs. Breckenridge behind the computer monitor, setting in its place a Captain America action figure.

"They will stop at nothing because they hate our way of life. They hate our freedom! Freedom you and I have to fight for every day."

"If we're constantly fighting for it, it's not really freedom, is it?"

"There there. I know you're angry, but that's no reason to start talking like a Communist, Jim," the infuriating man said.

Another lead skittered into the adjacent room. James could hear the splash it made as it threw itself into the toilet.

He didn't care.

"You know what? It's time for a chicken pot pie. You can go yell yourself red about the terrorists. I'm going to treat them like the children they are and let them scream and holler and hold their breath while I ignore them. And that goes for anybody else who wants to forgo intelligent discourse for explosives and flag-waving."

"You're playing right into their hands, Jim!"

"Then I'll personally take a dump right on their palms. Get off my desk."