Francis hadn't moved, hadn't said a word in five full minutes, but none of that mattered now. The story had already been decided before it started. He looked past Mason at the three officers walking up his lawn, spreading out, boxing him in against his own garage door. He looked at the neighbors watching, the phones recording, the quiet, terrible certainty settling over the whole street that something was about to happen here that couldn't be undone.
Francis felt his pulse climb, slow and steady, like a drum beat building towards something. He kept his hands visible, kept his voice locked behind his teeth, and he waited for whatever Mason had planned next. The three officers fanned out across the lawn like they'd rehearsed it. Francis clocked each one without turning his head.
Old habit, the kind you don't lose after years in the field. Big guy on the left, jaw set tight, hand already resting on his belt. That was Officer Travis Bellamy. Younger one on the right, eyes darting between Francis and the growing crowd of neighbors.
Officer Roy Grayson, nervous in a way the others weren't. And behind them, hanging back near the cruiser, a thinner officer who hadn't said a word yet. His name tag read Puren four against one in his own driveway. Mason stepped closer, boots crunching on the wet pavement where Francis had been washing his car 10 minutes ago.
The soap suds were already drying into chalky streaks on the concrete. "On your knees," Mason said. Francis didn't move. "For what? Tell me what I did."
"I said on your knees." Mason's voice cracked louder this time. Performing now, playing to the porches full of watching neighbors.
"You want to do this the hard way? That's fine by me." Bellamy took a step forward, hands sliding off his belt toward his holster. "You heard him."
Francis kept his hands open at his sides, palms out, slow and visible. He'd trained other agents on exactly this. How to survive an encounter when the badge on the other side had already decided who you were before you opened your mouth. Stay calm.
Stay still. Don't give them a reason. "I'm not resisting," Francis said, low and even. "I'm standing right here."
That wasn't the answer Mason wanted. His hand moved to his belt and came back up holding his taser, the yellow plastic bright and ugly in the morning sun. He raised it, pointing it square at Francis's chest. A gasp rippled through the small crowd gathering on the sidewalk.
The front door of the house banged open. "Francis!" Regina Willard came down the porch steps fast, phone already raised, her voice shaking, but loud enough to carry. "What is going on? Get that thing away from him."
"Ma'am, get back in the house," Grayson said. But there wasn't much force behind it. His eyes were on the taser, on Mason, like even he wasn't sure this was right.