The judge sat behind his desk. The courtroom consisted of brown wooden furniture and a high white ceiling. "What's the next"
BLAAAAAAAAARE
"NOT AGAIN!"
BLAAAAAAAAARE
"BAILIFF! WILL YOU SHUT THAT $!@##$ THING UP?"
"WHAT?"
"THE ALARM!" The judge gestured wildly. "OFF! OFF!"
The bailiff left and came back with a broom. He tried poking at the fire alarm, but to no avail. He tried swatting it down from the ceiling.
"SHUT IT UP! I DON'T CARE HOW!" yelled the judge at the sheriff.
"WHAT?"
"WHAT?"
"WHAT?"
The judge waved his arms at the sheriff's gun and the alarm.
The sheriff looked up and squinted. He took aim, shot a hole through the alarm, but it kept blaring. He shot again and it was hanging from the ceiling by one hook. One more shot and it fell down. Still blaring.
It landed on the judge's desk like a giant deranged beetle. BLAAAAAAAAAAA! The judge hit it repeatedly with the gavel until it was smashed to bits. It finally stopped. Fire alarms from other rooms of the courthouse could be heard in the distance. He held his gavel, staring at the alarm. It blared once more and he whacked it a few more times. The judge watched it, but this time it stayed dead.
The clerk read the case: "All rise. Johnson vs the State. Accused of setting off fire alarms and making a mockery of the court."
They all sat down again. "How do you plead?" asked the judge.
Jeff Johnson stood. He was a big man who had spent his life outdoors. He had a thick but well maintained beard and a sunworn face. He just stared down at the table in front of him. Fire alarms blared in the distance.
"My client wishes to plead Not Guilty, your honor," said Helen Swenson, his defendant, standing beside him. She was a blond in a canary yellow dress with big buttons all down the front.
"You look like Mickey Mouse," Johnson muttered to Ms. Swenson.
"Mr. Johnson," said the judge. "You come into my courtroom and all the fire alarms go off."
Johnson stared at his table.
"You came in yesterday and the same thing happened. We had to evacuate the building, and I sent you to prison for the night for causing the inconvenience. How did that go?"
The sheriff cleared his throat and stepped forward. "We took him to the prison, yer Honor. Into the prison. And the fire alarms all went off."
"In the prison?"
"Yes. We had to take him out again immediately, to the prison courtyard, because you have to evacuate the building if there's a fire."
"And?"
"And the fire department came, investigated, found no fire, and turned off the alarms. Then we took him in again and the alarms all went off."
The judge stared at him.
"Well, weren't going to be pushed around that easily. We put him in a cell, with other prisoners, and left him there. Let him stew a bit."
"And you turned off the alarms?"
"Ah, no, we weren't able to figure out how to do that."
The judge waited.
"After two hours, we were standing in the courtyard discussing it, and decided we could just set up a tent in the courtyard."
The judge arched an eyebrow.
"So we did that, and then we could turn off the alarms no problem. We just posted a guard to watch him there overnight."
"You were happy with this solution?" asked the judge.
Johnson was still staring at the desk, looking possibly redder than usual.
"Well. No. Not exactly. Some prisoners distracted the guard, grabbed him and brought him back in the prison (that set off the alarms again y'know) and they hid him somewhere. The fire department insisted the prison be evacuated to the courtyard again. Four prisoners attempted to escape while the building was being inspected, but they were caught again. They found Johnson tied up in the mailroom. After that we put him back in the courtyard and the rest of the prisoners in the prison."
Ms. Swenson spoke up. "I can corroborate. As his defendant, I had to meet with him, to discuss his case, but any building he was in had the fire alarms going off. I ended up being escorted into the prison courtyard to speak with him there."
"How can he plead not guilty?" asked the judge.
"He says it's involuntary. Any building he goes in, all the fire alarms go off. He doesn't know why, he doesn't know how, but he knows that they do. So he tries to live outside. He works as a forest ranger during the summers, and a freelance reporter the rest of the year."
"Why was he brought in in the first place?"
"He was living on the streets. The city cleared out the homeless encampment he was in and took him to a hostel. And he caused the hostel's fire alarms to all go off."
"So he's guilty of setting off fire alarms!"
"Not intentionally! It's involuntary. He's got fumosexcitatosis."
"You made that up."
"Look it up."
The clerk looked it up on Wikipedia. "Fumosexcitatosis is a rare medical condition that sets off fire alarms," he read incredulously.
"So you see," explained Ms. Swenson, "accusing him of disturbing the peace for just existing is a form of discrimination. Ditto for making a mockery of the court. It's unjust to hold it against him. Every building he went into, he went into involuntarily. It's a form of disability. He needs accommodations. In his case, simply to stay outdoors. Just by having him in this courtroom, you can hear quite clearly that you are violating his rights."
Fire alarms continued blaring beyond the courtroom's closed doors.
"Well, Mr. Johnson? If I turn you outside, will you stay outside? I could give you a card legally barring you from entering a building."
Jeff Johnson looked up. His face was hopeful, more hopeful than it had looked in a long time, but his eyes continued to dance through the possibilities. "... Only buildings with fire alarms?"
"... OK, only buildings with fire alarms, so noted."
"I think ... that is an excellent idea." He nodded cautiously. "Yes, thank you? That's mighty kind of you."
"Case dismissed. Please get out of my courthouse," said the judge.
Afterwards Jeff Johnson walked with Ms. Swenson towards the parking lot. "I can't thank you enough," he said. "This whole thing is so implausible. I wouldn't believe it myself if I didn't have to live it daily."
"Where are you going after this?" she asked.
He gestured at the city. "Oh, back to the homeless camp."
"Here's my car," she said. They were at a Winnebago in the parking lot.
"You live in a Winnebago?" he asked. "But, you're a lawyer, I'm sure you can afford more than a Winnebago?"
"Personal choice," she said, grinning in her yellow dress.
"That fumosomething ..."
"Fumosexcitatosis."
"You made that up, right?"
Ms. Swenson looked at the ground. "It turns out Wikipedia is editable."
Mr. Johnson looked at the ground too. "Well ..."
"Care to go for a ride?" she asked.
"Where to?"
"Thataway?" she pointed randomly.
Mr. Johnson pondered. "Does it have a fire alarm?"
"It does not."
He nodded. "Let's roll."
They got in and the Winnebago drove off into the sunset.
This was first posted on reddit.com r/WritingPrompts