Chapter 274

It was Monday with Thanksgiving on Friday and I was going to be at KCC until noon for the next three days and then take a four day holiday weekend. KCC was in the holiday mode already. The college basically shut down from Thanksgiving until January when the spring semester started.

We were all looking forward to having four days of family and friends together without having to do intense training and interviews. After the holiday, it would be back to the grind for the M&M projects. The M&M projects and the Rochester College Police Force all went active on January 1.

East Coast was going to have to bust ass to get all the systems in place and activated in between all the holidays.

At Michigan our 15 employees were already on payroll and on site along with the 15 DHS to oversee the installation. I was sure that DHS was going to have them install special cameras in certain areas because they were so eager to be on site so early.

Jason, Dad, Judge Slaughter and Joey along with several clerks were going to Minnesota for two weeks to oversee the installation there after the interviews at Michigan.

It was a working vacation; Jason did not know that I knew they had scheduled a deer hunt with muzzle loaders and a bobcat hunt with center-fire rifles with a hunting service.

Roseanne had come to me with the interview schedules that Jason had set up there. There were some days that Jason was only working afternoons and some day's mornings, leaving Roseanne and Cindy to interview those days. The list of hunting equipment they needed to take on the fax was a dead giveaway.

That was going on while the first fifteen from Minnesota - the best of all the applicants - were here getting aggressive training. Those fifteen we felt were the best and first choices to be in a supervisory role.

The girls all had lists of things they were going to do assisting the Moms who were the chief chefs. The entire gang had made it known point blank that Jenny was not going to stand for hours cooking.

Jenny's feet, back and legs were getting multiple massages every day now to ease her discomfort. She swore the boys were already in training. They were moving and kicking so much, she just knew they were going to be born with black and blue bruise marks.

We had just visited the doctor on Friday for another checkup. Dr. Peterson, Susan as she insisted we call her, was very pleased with the blood work, Jenny's weight and all the tests she had taken. Even though Jenny thought she was gaining too much, Susan insisted she was doing great with carrying twins. We had multiple snapshots from the sonogram to carry back to the family.

Lisa and Sandy (my mom) had been scouring the contents of attics for the last week or so, digging out all the baby things they had stored for years.

Bassinets and cribs, bronzed baby shoes and all kinds of sentimental things were making the rounds almost daily, bringing back precious memories for the folks.

The bassinets and cribs, little rockers and chairs that I never remembered had been sent out to be refinished. A couple of miles down the road were a wood-workers shop that specialized in that kind of work.

I helped Lisa and Mom carry the things to them. There must have been a dozen bib-overalled old gentlemen that worked there; the youngest might have been 65. Gray beards, old corn cob pipes and ball caps were the uniform of the day. One would have thought we had carried them furniture from the Smithsonian by the way they carried on over the things.

From the conversation they had with Lisa, they restored a lot of furniture for her. It was a regular event that every time she went with Jason she went to every antique shop she could find while he was working and always brought back something.

With the morning work finished at KCC by 12:30, I was at the refreshment center having a loaded salad for lunch with my brood, when all the cell phones rang at the same time.

This was not a good thing; it was an emergency call from one of our many sites. Something terrible was going on somewhere that required immediate attention.

I answered the call while the other girls were looking at the accompanying messages.

It was Dan Parker, the director of our site at Warrington Community College. "We have two shooters on campus. We are responding in force," he said.

"We are on our way, do what you need to do. Keep me informed when you can," I replied.

All six of us were standing and headed for the door. Lorrie was on the phone to Carson at the airport office, "Get us a plane and pilots to Warrington North Carolina 'Now' they have shooters on campus!" she yelled into the phone. We are on our way.

As we headed out, the girls ran to their office to get to get their go bags and laptops. We met Jason and Cindy in the hall, "I'm coming with you," they both said.

We were at Morton field in record time. One of the leased Lear 55's was on the terminal building tarmac with the engine away from the steps running and the other was spinning up waiting on us to board.

While we were boarding, the pilot was communicating with the tower. The seat belts were not even fastened when the plane started moving.

Warrington was almost two hours in the Lear 55 with the turbines fully redlined. There was little we could do but be observers on the way. Then we could help sort out the mess when it was over and we were there.