Brian Steele - 4POCALYPSE - Four Tales of a Dark Future

“Officers Long and Cooper to base,” Long said into a microphone pinned to his left shoulder. “We need EMT assistance at 9700 Kansas City Corridor, Sector Forty-nine, Sub-terrain Ninety-two. We have a SCH Heroin overdose.”

As usual, there would not be a reply but Officer Long heard the base call out to the EMT team. It took an ETA of thirty minutes in that sector, which would be ample time for the team to complete their report on their datapad. A medical examiner would then take the data and complete the entry with the results of their autopsy. That information would then be stored and opened for anyone to see. In the underground, there were very few secret documents. There was not enough disk space or room to store any flash drives of frivolous documents. There also wasn’t enough security to make one feel safe about storing a document they wanted kept from prying eyes.

Jasmine put the handkerchief back into her sling bag, and pulled out the datapad and handed it to Officer Long. Jasmine did most entries. He only did DOA. It was an agreement they made when they became partners. She didn’t do DOAs very well. In fact, it would be a sleepless night as it was and even worse had she typed the specifics in.

They stepped out into the corridor and watched as Officers Guy and Sanford rode toward them on newer, updated Electro Glides that were based on the old Segway technology and design but used less battery.

Looking at Jasmine, Sanford knew there was a body in the room; he didn’t have to hear the request. “It’s not your fault, Cooper, you can’t save them all,” Sanford said sympathetically when they stopped in front of Jasmine.

“You save more than you lose, Cooper,” Guy continued. “A hell of a lot more than the rest of us.”

Jasmine didn’t respond. She brushed away new tears from her eyes, but the officers knew they were tears for the kid; Jasmine was one of the most deadly officers they’d ever met and nothing frightened her.

Nothing.

Jasmine stepped onto her Electro Glide transport, mumbling, cursing the traffic that streamed past the door. Although the corridors were the width of an eight-lane highway it seemed as if everyone who lived there were rushing about, and not one person or transport slowed down or pulled over to let the emergency personnel on to the emergency lane. It was worse than when her parents were stuck in rush hour traffic on Interstate 635. She hated the underground, the people, the traffic, the stupid transport, but more importantly, she hated the Last Pharmacist.

They looked over to Jasmine. She was stoic, silent, as if controlling her emotions from some sort of Zen training. Authorities were forbidden to express any type of emotion, especially anger, in public, even when in pursuit or confrontation. She looked at the door with an expression that sent a shiver down Officer Long’s spine. He pitied the man who was behind all this

“I’ll meet you at the center,” Jasmine said in a near whisper, and then whipped across the corridor into the traffic flow.

“She’s going for him, isn’t she,” Officer Guy asked. “She’s going to find that guy and break him into little bitty pieces.”

Officer Long didn’t reply. He knew Jasmine would be going after the pharmacist, and even though he’d tried to talk her out it, nothing was going to stop her. “She lost her father to a junkie,” Long said, after coughing away the same emotion Jasmine had while bending over the boy. Although she was well-trained, held the best close rate, held the highest rating as a marksman, held a third degree black belt, and had broken every record ever set on the force, he was still afraid for her. Even though the most lethal person he had ever met, she had the softest heart of anyone he knew.

Coming down the corridor in a slow but steady pace, the EMT cart approached 9700 in a cold yet professional manner.

Citizens stopped and stared, all knowing very well what lay in the small apartment.

More available than water, the Heroin rushed through the underground highways looking for a new host as if the drug itself was a virus.

Jasmine sat and watched as Commander Baul Herne dug through a box that looked as if it had been one of the original artifacts confiscated before the meteor hit. It wasn’t unusual to see someone clinging to the past but the commander’s action actually entertained her. As he dug deeper, his profanity became worse and she didn’t have a clue what he was looking for.

After a few minutes of digging, he huffed and armed beads of sweat from a pockmarked forehead, mumbling curse words definitely forbidden by an officer, especially in front of a subordinate.

“Is there something I can help you with, sir?” Jasmine asked while trying to keep the humor out of her voice. She loved the commander, and he loved her, but she was thinking if she started laughing, she might hurt his feelings.

He mumbled, cursed again, and then finally looked up as he replied, “I wanted to show you what things look like outside.” He tossed a thick stack of photos on the table. “Pictures that don’t make the intranet, too gross to make the intranet, and highly censored—” he coughed, “—pictures only shared by high ranking officers and what’s left of our government.”

Jasmine picked up the stack and became wide eyed as she saw what people were doing to each other. In the background, she heard Commander Herne continue, “When we send a platoon, most of them come back… when we send a loner, we never see them again…”

She thumbed through the photos in silence, taking in the inhumane actions. “These are human skulls, aren’t they…?” Jasmine said more to herself than to Commander Herne. “A warning?”

“Yeah, that and scare tactics.” He sat down. “Those skulls are at the Texas-Oklahoma boarder, not far from where your dad and I grew up, the Red River area, and some of those skulls belong to our troops, troops that were sent to police the outer perimeter. When you come out from the Oklahoma underground that’s what you’ll see first… those skulls. Only God knows what else you’ll find.”

“What about the Kansas-Oklahoma border? What will I find?”

Commander Herne grimaced before saying, “The same but much worse. Evidently, they think the Kansas force is harsher than Oklahoma. We do have a larger force. Maybe that’s why.”

Jasmine stared at the pictures one-by-one, committing not the horror but the surroundings to memory. She was thinking that she wanted the lay of the land when, like a prairie dog, she poked her head out of the hole. “Do you have any more?” She asked, finally handing the pictures back. “The maps I have are before the impact. I can’t find any as of late.”

Commander Herne looked at her with sorrow in his eyes and a frown that nearly broke her heart. “Jaz, honey, I’d die if something happens to you—” he cleared away a knot in his throat. “There are really bad people out there, people that will rape you, brutalize you, kill you, then cook and eat you, and I’m not saying this to scare you.”

“I know, Uncle Baul, but someone has to stop that bastard. It’s obvious that we’re failing to stop the drugs from entering the cities so we have to go after the guy who is distributing the drugs, and why in the hell are they calling him the Last Pharmacist.”

Commander Herne stood; his six-foot frame cast a gray shadow over his desk to Jasmine’s hands as if wanting to hide the pictures she was studying.

“I really don’t know the answer to that and I don’t believe anyone does, but what I do know is there have been at least a dozen bounty hunters, trained and untrained, that have gone after the bastard, and that’s just from Kansas. None of them have returned. He has even eluded the Texas Rangers, which I might add is impressive…” He paused. “And Jasmine, some of those men were top notch peace officers. Men who scared the hell outta me. Hell, we even sent a platoon of men who I knew for sure would catch and kill the bastard but he’s as elusive as the frigging wind… None of those guys returned, Jaz. Zero.”