Kent had been here before so he knew what to expect, but theothers were perplexed. On the desk in front of every seat was a large, rubber dinosaur,each about eighteen inches in length.
Kent took his seat, listening to the others speculatingabout what the dinosaurs were for.
“Perhaps it’s a free gift, something to take back for thekids,” said one of the few female D.I.s present.
“No, it’ll be for some sort of game or training exercise. You’llsee,” said Dan Bradley, confidently.
Not even close, thought Kent. They would find out soonenough.
There were a variety of different dinosaurs present, includingall of the old favourites that had fascinated children for generations. Therewere plenty of Pterodactyls, T Rexes and Stegosauruses on display. Kent was notat all amused to see that he had been assigned a Brontosaurus.
He was quite sure this hadn’t been just a coincidence. Everyoneknew that the Brontosaurus was the largest, dumbest dinosaur with the smallestbrain. Summerfield had clearly given him that one to make a point. Well, he wouldhave cause to regret that later. The Brontosaurus may have been fat and stupidbut it did have a nice, firm, long neck which would come in very handy.
The meeting was scheduled to start at precisely 9.30am. Righton cue, Summerfield walked confidently, almost arrogantly, into the room,taking his place behind the lectern. Then he launched into his speech.
“Embracing Change,” he announced. “What do we mean by that? Arewe talking about technology? Are we talking about new regulations? Or maybechanges in the law?”
He paused, for dramatic effect, waiting to see if there wasany reaction from the audience, but nobody dared to say anything. The silence wasbroken by the man in the seat behind Kent sneezing very loudly and veryviolently. Judging by the tiny flecks of phlegm he felt hit the back of hisneck, he hadn’t even bothered to put his hand over his mouth.
Nobody said, “Bless you,” not even Summerfield who ignoredthe sneeze and continued.
“No. I’m not talking about any of those things. I’m talkingabout you, the people here in this room. Now I’m sure you are all wondering whyyou’ve got a dinosaur on the desk in front of you. Well, what we are going todo now is play a little game to find out why. Stand up and pick up yourdinosaurs,” he commanded.
“See, I told you it was a game,” Kent heard Bradley say tothe female D.I. he had been talking to earlier.
The dinosaurs were much heavier than they looked and prettybulky.
“Tuck them under your arm and walk up and down the rows,” orderedSummerfield.
They did as instructed. There was not a lot of space in theroom, which was not much bigger than a squash court. With all the tables andchairs to negotiate and the rubber dinosaurs under their arms, the delegateskept bumping into each other. Kent, at eighteen stone, found squeezing pastpeople difficult at the best of times and cursed as someone else’s Stegosaurusplates snagged on his belt, almost causing him to lose his balance. This hadhappened the first time he had lived this day, too, but even with foresight he hadn’tmanaged to stop it happening again.
“OK, that’s enough,” snapped Summerfield. “Back to yourseats, the lot of you.”
Kent complied. He could have carried out his plan there andthen but he wanted to wait until Summerfield had really pissed everybody offand there was plenty more to come. He wanted the audience on his side.
With everyone back in their seats, Summerfield continued. “Sohow did that feel?”
Again, nobody dared to answer so he continued. “Prettydifficult, right? Shall I tell you why I asked you to carry those dinosaursaround?”
There was the almost inevitable silence in response. It waslike they were all scared in case they said the wrong thing, thought Kent.
“I’ll tell you why,” said Summerfield. “It’s because that’swhat you are – dinosaurs. The way you do your jobs and the way you lead yourlives is outdated, slow and plodding. There’s no room for the likes of you inthe modern police force. Quite frankly, you all need a massive kick up thearse. I’m going to drag you into the 21st century if it’s the last thing I do.”
Summerfield paused, his eyes feasting on the sea of shockedfaces in front of him. He had them right where he wanted them and their silencemerely spurred him on.
“Now you’re either with me or without me,” he added. “If you’renot with me, I’ll make sure you end up as extinct as these dinosaurs. Do I makemyself clear?”
There were a few half-hearted nods from the audience, who hadjust had the stuffing well and truly knocked out of them. As for Kent, hecontinued to bide his time and say nothing.
“Right then, we’ll begin,” said Summerfield, who showed off thefact that he had the latest generation of smartwatch by theatrically pressing abutton on it to advance the presentation on to the next slide. It was entitled “TheWay Forward”.
Over the next half an hour, Summerfield ripped the audience topieces with one savage criticism after another. They were accused of racism andsexism, the previous evening’s sexist jokes at the bar being brought up as evidence,even though it had been he who had instigated them. They were also accused of beingparochial and not seeing “the bigger picture”.
That was just one of a whole series of buzzwords thatSummerfield threw into his speech. Almost every sentence was interspersed with someoutdated marketing phrase or other. “Thinking outside the box”, “pushing theenvelope” and “keeping people in the loop” all featured heavily. Kent was remindedof an old printout someone had once passed around during his training daysentitled ‘Buzzword Bingo’ with all these phrases listed on it. The idea wasthat you ticked them off as they were said in a meeting. He could easily have hita full house today the way Summerfield was going on.
He sat patiently and listened, waiting for the two shockannouncements at the end that would be his
