Rusk didn't answer at first, then, "Trooper."
Barnes nodded once, acknowledging nothing. His gaze returned to the stage.
"Sheriff, step down from the microphone."
Halverson's nostrils flared. "Excuse me."
Barnes spoke as if he was reading weather. "This is not a request."
The gym held its breath.
Gordon Pell rose from his front-row seat with practiced calm, smoothing his jacket as if he was stepping into a conference room.
"Trooper," he said warmly, "I think there's a misunderstanding. Our firm is providing emergency resources. We're trying to help this community recover."
Barnes didn't even look at him yet. "Mr. Pell, you'll have a chance to answer questions. Right now, I'm addressing the sheriff."
Halverson tightened his smile into something that looked painful. "You don't have jurisdiction over my briefing."
Barnes's expression didn't change. "Then let's move this outside. Sheriff Halverson, you are being directed to provide your emergency orders, siren maintenance logs, and any signed vendor coordination agreements to state investigators. Immediately."
Halverson's voice sharpened, slipping. "You can't demand county records on the spot in front of the public."
Barnes finally let a hint of steel show. "I can in a declared disaster when there's credible evidence those records were used to pressure residents into property transfer. And I'm not alone."
He nodded toward the back doors. They opened wider.
Two more troopers stepped inside, then two more. Behind them, not troopers, came a small cluster of men and women in plain jackets with state seals, clipboards, and camera bags.
The kind of people who didn't show up unless somebody higher had already decided the situation smelled wrong.
The crowd began to shift and murmur. Not anger now, something closer to fear, but turned outward, toward the stage.
Halverson's eyes darted. He was counting bodies the way he'd counted cameras in Martha's yard.
Only now, the cameras weren't held by bikers. They were held by the state.
Martha stayed standing in the aisle, papers in her hands, phone held steady. She didn't speak. She didn't need to.
She watched Halverson's control peel away in layers.
Barnes lifted his voice slightly so the room heard every word. "We are also opening an inquiry into the county's tornado siren failure. Specifically, the timing of the system being offline prior to the storm."
A woman in the middle rows gasped. "They turned it off."
A man near the wall barked, "My kids were outside when it hit."
Halverson raised the microphone trying to regain the room. "That's speculation. The sirens failed because of storm conditions."
Barnes snapped his head toward him. "The storm hadn't started when the logs indicate the system was offline."
Pell stepped closer to the stage edge, smile gone now, replaced by controlled irritation. "Trooper, this is going to cause panic. People need stability."