Presidential Curfew Order

Alex watched silently from their bed as his girlfriend carried two mugs of tea for the both of them.

"Thank you." He took one before eagerly sipping from it.

She placed her own on the nightstand to let it cool slightly.

"I think we should just, maybe, stay home." Angel fastened herself onto him.

"I'm sorry, come again?" He asked for a clarification.

"Max told me that their school is doing all sorts of prevention, well, a few months ago… He told me that there was a cop talking to them and warning them… I don’t know what they’re going to do…”

“Is he going anywhere tomorrow?”

“I told him not to.”

“That’s great.” Alex launched the projector. It showed a dashboard of content for today on the opposite wall.

The interface was a cluster of news clips, pre-recorded shows, a central square that says Live Now with a picture of the video.

Live Now
President Johnson Declares State of Emergency For CA

Play

“These past few weeks has been a turbulent time for us, for California, and for the country.” The governor nodded solemnly beside him. “We have heard voices from both sides. The so-called ‘Bearist Association of California,’ with their rhetoric that the federal government had failed them; and the activists who are pushing against that, some call them ‘Unionists.’ These parties have engaged in physical scuffles in the past weeks, not only contributing to the disruption of public life in California, but their use of violence is unacceptable. Violence of any kind, including political, is purely unacceptable, and we will use all our resources to prosecute those that threaten or act with violence.”

The electric shutter click whirring from the crowd of reporters could be heard during the pause as the President checked his notes.

“In view of the current situation, we have decided to impose a State of Emergency Curfew on the State of California for an indefinite period. All interstate travel that either enters or leaves the boundary of the state shall be illegal six hours after this proclamation until the situation is resolved. National services, including national parks, museums, and metro travel will operate at a limited capacity and all citizens are subject to a security search. Under this current declaration, a curfew will be imposed from 11 pm until 6 am the following day. Any action in pursuance of a political aim or otherwise, that uses violence as a tool, will be prosecuted likewise to the fullest extent of the law.”

Either of them sitting in front of the projected image could have sworn that the President’s reading of the text reverberated off the walls.

“I’ll take some questions.” The President of the United States pointed to a reporter in the crowd. “Yes, sir?”

“Will we see the deployment of any state units or the National Guard?”

“We have no plans and we are not trying to.” Johnson snuck a peek at his advisors standing off-camera. “It will have to be the National Guard if it comes to it, because we are seeing a breakdown of Californian life. We hope we don’t have to, but we might have to resort to that if we are made to.”

President Johnson addresses Californian riots

Washington, DC - June 22, 2098

The broadcast video title ticked over.

“What we are doing here in the state is that we are trying to minimize damage to itself as a whole— To alleviate dangers and to settle accounts. As your President, I assume the responsibility to secure California and the United States as a whole, and to fix what is wrong with it.” Johnson gripped tight onto his podium. “We need to protect our people and our property, no less the world-class universities and research institutions we have in California. We didn’t want to record more than 200 arrests as you have undoubtedly tallied and reported on, but unfortunately, we have to.”

His blinking sank into irregularity as he looked to an offscreen crowd for further questions.

“Mr President, what would you be doing to get these investigations going and return everyone to a normal life?”

“We pushed through and made happen one of the most comprehensive justice reform in the world. We have a more cooperative Department of Justice working with our state DOJ branches, and as you well know,” the President gestured to the reporter himself. “We extended the ability for law enforcement, working with the DOJ, to keep persons of interest for longer if they have to, give them the time to do their work and investigate. All we want, and I think I can speak for California as well for this, is to make sure justice is served and that we get to the bottom of this. Peace is all we want. We want families, communities, society at large to not just be safe, but to feel like they are safe. Giving more power to law enforcement will certainly help in that direction.”

“Mr President, Mr President,” A nervous-sounding female reporter raised her voice. “How are you going to acknowledge the families— the families of those who died, of those who were incarcerated over the past weeks— on the demonstrations? Will you be taking action?”

“Good question.” He cleared his throat. “We have joined a Council to tackle it within this week. We are pushing legislation to stop this from happening again, and we are making amends with the families. We are making our awareness of the situation in Anaheim very apparent. We have been working closely with law enforcement and our federal agencies to stamp out the kind of political violence you are seeing today, I don’t care if they are on our side or not, violence is simply unacceptable. You’ll see the fruits of those investigations very soon.”

“Yes, sir?” He pointed to another in the crowd. “What’s that?”

“How do you respond to allegations that members of your law enforcement programs have embellished funds and placed the public who had nothing to do with this in jeopardy by limiting when they could work,” Johnson nodded while carefully digesting what the interviewer is trying to say. “The Californian public has already had huge amounts of discontent with regard to how hard it is for them to sustain their livelihoods. Wouldn’t this just make it harder for them?”

“I do agree with you that this decision is unfortunate, yet it is completely necessary. Our priorities in a crisis are always to leave those unharmed, well, unharmed. So we had to take into consideration something out of the ordinary. This is the best temporary resolve we have. Given certain recent movements.”

The crowd sprang up a dozen new arms after every answer.

“His job is to give vague answers. Gives himself some space in the process.” Alex kissed her on the cheek. “Right. Let’s see if they give any proclamation or anything.”

“Why did you condemn the Bearists in the same stroke as the Unionists, when the Bearists had been relatively peaceful compared to the physical assaults committed by the Unionists?” Another reporter stood up.

Johnson’s face showed no expression or emotion, and began walking off the stage to a rush of reporters trying to gain his attention as they moved closer to the lectern. The President disappeared into his crowd of aides, security, and staff, out of the Press Briefing Room.

"Stay home with me, sugar. I don't think anyone is really going to work." Angel leaned onto him. "Now if no one is allowed out after eleven, we have to stock up during the day. And I don't know what's going to happen with Max, or my parents, or your parents—"

"Let's stay up all night. I mean, it's already well after midnight. What Johnson is doing is complete negligence. He doesn't understand that people will further panic. He doesn't realize that some of us will utterly freak out and make things worse. He’s pinning it all on the Bearist protestors, but who’s beating them? Not that they are completely blameless."

His girlfriend stared at him with a small sliver of childish innocence as she sipped her tea.

"Syrup, they are going to ransack groceries from any store they can land on. They will only be one step above those thugs, because at least they paid. But panic will ensue. Nobody knows exactly what they should be doing."

“Yeah… I think it would be annoying. But, I worry for those people I care about.”

“We have an entire day to call them. As for Max, well, what is he going through in school?”

“Divisional arithmetic? Something to do with long divisions and fractions. And touching on the Civil War?” Angel smiled in embarrassment. “I’m not sure, I don’t check.”

“That’s fine.” Alex pushed a fist onto his face. “I’ll try to make sure he doesn’t fall too far behind. That said, if no one is going to school anyway, what exactly are they missing? Maybe we do have to cancel as a last resort.”

“Okay.” Her girlfriend tried to hide her disappointment from him in the event he might take it differently. “I’ll try to communicate with them.”

“Don’t we have a cake left over? I’m kinda hungry.”

“Yeah, me too. I’ll go get the cake.”

Angel heard the stirring behind Max’s door. She knew it, but she went and grabbed it from the fridge anyway. Then the knock.

The noise inside went away. She opened the door.

Angel left the plate on top of his desk.

“It’s alright if you’re not asleep.” She placed a hand on her brother’s forehead.

Max opened his eyes reluctantly.

“Come on.”

Alex watched as his girl strung along Max with her.

"Huh, that was a bit unexpected." Alex was passed the plate while Max was hoisted up to the bed with them. "Careful."

He took out a chunk of the slab of chocolate cake and fed it to Angel. "You don't have to go to school tomorrow."

"Yeah."

“Huh, if your friends aren’t coming tomorrow, I’ll take you to that burger joint.” Alex’s voice trailed off.

“Mm. Okay.”

Then their attention was back on themselves. Apart from a few loose attempts at sharing the cake, most of the slice was gone between the pair. They watched a few late-night talk shows and a wedge of a documentary before Max left on his own volition. They didn’t even notice.