Incident: The Trillas Center (PG-13)
Posted on Wed 22 April 2020 in Tales from the Delta Worlds
Another day, another call from one of my company’s satellite branches. I wasn’t too enthusiastic about what lied before me, but as president of Shirohoshi Enterprises, it was my job to see to such issues and fix them as best I could.
The Trillas Center, though… One of our therapy locations. It wasn’t looking all that great.
I entered through the front doors, looking around at what seemed to be a mess in the front waiting lobby. Tables were upturned, a few of the chairs were on their sides or backs… Even the reception desk was in disarray. It looked like a fight had started, but I knew that wasn’t the case.
With a sigh, I tapped the back of my hand against the OmNI reader for the next door, causing the sliding doors to part and let me through. Like the front area, it was an absolute disaster. Plants and decorative pieces were strewn about the floor. Pictures torn apart, with plastiglass mixed in the debris around them. Even tatters of clothing were visible among everything. I felt really unsettled just looking at it.
The same could be seen down the various hallways as I continued. Nurse’s stations with paperwork and computer parts all over the place. Therapy rooms upended. Even some of the empty patient rooms looked insanely grim. Then, in the back section, I could see many of the employees and patients sitting on the floor, arms and legs zip-tied together as local PD grilled them. Needless to say, it took everything in my power not to pull my Freelanzer out and skewer the lot of them. They saw me, and no doubt they saw the momentary anger I showed in my face.
With the door physically ripped off, I made my way inside, holding up my employee badge to make sure I identified myself.
“TeraDyne Hitokage-E—”
Before I could even finish saying my name, one of their people tackled me to the ground from behind, trying to wrap my wrists with a zip-tie. I let him.
“As I was saying, I’m the president of Shirohoshi Enterprises.” My glare up at one of the officers couldn’t have been clearer. “You’re in violation of Global Ordinance one-eight-two, section five. And now bordering on getting recycled, I might add.”
Another of the helmeted officers took my badge, looking it over. The terror in his voice actually felt satisfying. “Oh fu— Cut the tie, Private! Cut her loose!”
“Sir?”
“Do it, Private!”
His scissors slipped between my arms, cutting the plastic binding as quickly as they could. I grabbed my badge back and slipped the lanyard around my neck, still not in the best of moods. The lieutenant who had me freed stepped back a bit, but it gave me enough time to see his nametag. “Sorry, ma’am. Hard to tell with all these crazies here.”
“Trust me, Lt. Johnson, the only crazy people here are your officers.” I brushed a bit of dust from the short fur around my legs and chest. “You realize you just raided a government-backed therapy center, right?”
I could tell the guy was getting nervous. Of course, my reputation preceded me. Most knew not to fuck with the crazy Cobalion lady from Shirohoshi. “No, ma’am. The mayor ordered us to shut this place down. Arrest everyone inside for pedophilia and child trafficking. Said she saw little girls being used for sex.”
“Oh! Mayor Greenwall caused this?” I asked, looking around at the people who had been detained. Most of the patients looked like they were scared shitless, and my employees looked just as angry as I was. Even the synthetic ones that normally couldn’t show such emotion. “Well, let me bring you and your team up to speed.
“This facility is a therapy center for paedophiles looking to bring their urges under control. Those willing to seek help.” I walked over to one of the equipment lockers nearby, pulling out one of the TransSuits used. “See this? This tan lion cub piece? It’s a TransSuit, made so an adult can put it on to look like a minor. It gives these people a safe outlet while they’re getting the help they need, so they don’t start having uncontrollable urges.”
I opened the back zipper and slid my feet inside, soon joined by my arms and upper body, then my head. The moment the zip closed up, I found myself considerably shorter, probably just over a meter. My equine muzzle and horns were replaced by a short feline snout and rounded ears, while my hooves found themselves as small digitgrade paws, and my hands into clawed paw-like hands. I also had a short tail swaying behind me, the fur tuft at the end feeling just a tad tingly in the airflow of the room.
“And as you can see, I’ve changed.” I said, my voice sounding very childish and pre-teen. “I am still an adult, but I’ve taken a child form. What happens like this is not paedophilia, because it’s between two consenting adults.”
I just as swiftly extracted myself from the suit, returning to my normal height as the spacial compression effect faded. “Now, I suggest you let everyone go while I deal with Mrs. Greenwall.
“Sorry, Ms. Ezeri.” Johnson said, sounding sincerely apologetic. “We can’t. Not without the mayor’s approval.”
“First of all, I’m one of Shiromori’s global leaders. I outrank your mayor many times over. Second, you’re out of your jurisdiction, cause we’re about ten miles from the border of Sailen Hills. And third, by the end of today, you’ll be helping plan an emergency re-election for a new mayor. So, I suggest getting those ties off of everyone and vacating. Otherwise, you’ll be looking for a new line of work.”
I didn’t stick around as Johnson got his team working on freeing everyone. I was too angry to supervise it. Thankfully, Aika had my back and came in to oversee everything, bringing some of the janitorial crew to help clean the place up as well. As for me, I was marching into town hall with a chip on my shoulder. Well, a lion cub TransSuit, but irregardless, I wasn’t about to let things slide.
Two of the security guards tried to keep me from going into the main hall, but I’d gotten my own cadre of global agents from headquarters to back me up, each of them armed with stun rifles. Wasn’t about to hurt anyone not involved in the incident. Surprisingly, the doors weren’t locked.
I flung the slabs of wood open and made my way down the center aisle, chairs full of townspeople that just stared at me like I was some sort of alien. I really didn’t pay too much attention to them, though. My eyes were locked on the jaguar sitting at the center of the table ahead of me. A lavish dress and pearls around her neck, earrings lining each ear, and just… I was beyond livid.
“Mayor Greenwall, you’re under arrest.” I called out, motioning for my people to move forward. “Ordering a raid on a mental health facility is not only low, it’s highly illegal.”
“I stopped your child sex ring, bitch!” She screeched into the microphone, making sure she could be heard.
With a simple point of my hand, one of the agents fired his sidearm at the sound equipment, blowing the thing apart. Meanwhile, I held up the suit from earlier. “No, what you stopped was adults using TransSuits to help people keep their urges under control until they could do the job on their own. You quite literally caused a number of patients to be set back by months, if not years, in their therapy. There wasn’t a single child in that facility.”
“BULLSHIT!”
I watched as she continued ranting while my officers pulled her arms into cuffs. The moment she started running for the door, I lowered my shoulder and slammed into her, sending the cunt over my back and onto the floor hard. Like hell I was going to let this pussy get away.
About a dozen people grabbed hold of Greenwall and began dragging her away, despite all the snarling and growling she did. Once miss dumbass was out the door, I went up to the podium where citizens could ask questions, and grabbed the mic to make a bit of an announcement of my own. Before I completely lost my cool.
“I apologize for having to subject everyone to this. My name is TeraDyne Hitokage-Ezeri, president of Shirohoshi Enterprises. Your mayor ordered a raid on the Trillas Center, well beyond the borders of your city. Not only was that raid illegal according to global law, but was done knowing what happened behind those doors.”
I had to pause, taking a deep breath just to calm myself a bit while I dragged a stool over to the pedestal. “Trillas Center has always been transparent, even allowing tours of the facility to encourage those needing its assistance to step forward. Anyone could ask for such a tour, even in anonymity through the use of a loaned TransSuit to wear for their protection.
“I know cameras are rolling, so look closely.” I quickly got back into the cub suit, before climbing up onto the stool and bringing the mic down to my level. I think my altered voice had caught a number of townsfolk off-guard, given the looks they were giving me. “So, look at one of the children Mrs. Greenwall claimed was being assaulted in there. As I told your mayor before her outburst, we have consenting therapists wear these to help patients deal with those urges, until they gain the ability to do so without constant assistance. That is what she saw in there.”
A few people were looking rather uncomfortable, with others glaring or starting to get annoyed. Good…
“We’re moving our people and patients to a temporary facility while repairs are made to Trillas Center. Once it’s reopened, I plan on making a televised tour to show the public just how our therapists help those who need it. Nothing overtly graphic, but enough information to hope that this sort of incident doesn’t happen in the future. Again, I apologize for storming into this meeting, but given what happened, time could not be wasted. Good day.”
I jumped down from my perch and began walking out of the room still feeling the anger and indignation from many who watched me. I didn’t care at that point. The investigation would be handled by Global Affairs, so it was out of my hands, or rather paws, at that point. I just wanted to get back to headquarters, make my report for GA, and relax for a while.
Several months passed, and I made good on the promise of the televised tour. Did the entire thing as in a custom foal-sized Cobalion suit, just to hammer the point home. Seemed some people hated me for it, but oh well. You can’t control the public’s opinion… Well, not ethically, anyway.
But the best part? A twenty-four juror panel heard Greenwall’s trial. None of them were even remotely on Shirohoshi payroll, with a majority working for rival companies that did business on our worlds. Fourteen days of facts and testimony, ending in a unanimous guilty verdict. And because of the callous outburst she had when it came in, the judge ordered her to undergo rehabilitation therapy. Cue five more violent outbursts, and she was looking at exile, or potentially going through recycling, if she proved to be too much of a threat.
Fourteen days after that, she lashed out at a therapist who brought up Trillas, and… Well, she got what I thought she deserved from the beginning. The new stone jaguar fountain looks real nice in the courtyard. I wanted obsidian-granite, but the center decided to go with a nice black marble. I wasn’t about to take that away from the staff, so of course, it’s black marble.
For now, it was nice and quiet at the therapy center. I was running it as a temporary manager while Aika found a replacement. People needed help, and I wasn’t about to let all the effort of our therapists go to waste. Not after the legal fight we’d went through.
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