NW Operation Department, B6 Unit Office.
Holding coffee, the security guard, stretching in the guard room, watched a tall man bathed in morning light come toward the gate, dragging a bloodstained cart, and nervously dropped his coffee cup to the ground.
He didn’t care about the burn and fumbled to draw his pistol from his waist, issuing a warning, "Stop right there, this is an NW outpost, stop immediately!"
A small milky-yellow dog, only thirty centimeters long, popped its head out from behind the tall man, baring its teeth at the security guard.
Brian looked puzzled at the security guard, pointing to the NW police badge pinned on his suit lapel, "Buddy, I’m the Autopsy Officer Brian here. You seem new; where’s the previous guard?"
Once he saw the badge clearly, the security guard sheathed his pistol and breathed a sigh of relief, "Sorry, it’s my first day. The previous guard, I heard, was reading color magazines during the attack a few days ago when a lunatic slit his throat with a knife."
He stepped forward, "Need help with... er..."
The security guard saw the motionless thin man on the cart, his limbs covered in blood, wearing a filthy apron and a gas mask around his neck, and his smile froze again, "Is that a corpse?"
"Not a corpse, a criminal. Help me open the gates, buddy, and if possible, get someone to rinse the pickup parked by the roadside with water. Charge it to B6 Unit’s account."
"Sure thing, Brian, um, by the way, did you say you’re an Autopsy Officer?" the guard, looking at the precise gunshot wounds to the man’s limbs on the cart, asked again uncertainly.
Such ruthless gun skills.
You call that an Autopsy Officer?
Brian frowned slightly, "Yes, buddy, open the gate, I’m in a rush, otherwise, this guy might lose too much blood."
This new guard sure talks a lot.
It’s now past seven in the morning.
Work starts at nine, and the others haven’t arrived yet.
While there’s still time,
Brian pulled the cart down to the basement level, threw the nameless suspect onto a gurney, poured disinfectant, and took out a never-used scalpel to remove the bullets from the wound.
The unconscious man let out pig-like screams.
This is an autopsy room, not a medical office.
Brian dealt the man a punch, employing physical anesthesia.
He operated like a precise robot, no motion wasted, deftly removed the bullets lodged in the man’s joints, then sloppily bandaged and stitched up the wounds.
Such gunshot wounds require precious treatment reagents to heal without crippling; considering the gravity of the offender’s crimes, it wasn’t worth the effort.
It needed to be mentioned.
California does have the death penalty, although it’s a long wait, but at least death comes swiftly.
This world is different.
With the Blood Moon, lifers flipping beds in prisons happen frequently, and various official Mutant labs welcome these serious offenders with open arms and wads of cash.
After finishing the hemorrhage control and suturing the wounds,
Brian hauled the man to his office, found a large box, arranged him to look like a gift, placed a big bag of unrefined, smelly contraband drugs beside it, topped with a bow, and left it at Susan’s office door.
Having done all this,
Brian yawned and lay down on Susan’s office sofa, quickly falling into a deep sleep.
Shi San, pecking like a chicken, curled up underneath the sofa, snoring lightly.
Susan, with dark circles under her eyes, was the first to arrive at the office.
The moment she opened the door,
Her nose twitched twice, and she cautiously pressed her hand on the revolver at her waist, scanning the office until she spotted the large cardboard box at her office door.
"Isn’t that the box the TV came in?"
Susan approached and discovered a note on the box: "A gift for Susan, don’t forget our arrangement - Brian."
Below the handwriting was the address of the Crematorium.
When Brian was woken by the noise, it was already noon.
He opened his eyes to find in the office outside, the sounds of cursing and objects colliding, and a thin blanket covering him.
A bruised and swollen unfamiliar man burst through Susan’s office door, falling onto the carpet, curling up and holding his stomach, groaning.
Brian glanced at him, confirmed he didn’t recognize him, then stepped over his body to the outer office.
Inside the small office, packed with people.
One side had the outnumbered old Hardenn and his group; the other side had a dozen strong men armed with guns and NW Operation badges and a capable woman holding a tablet.
Among them, Ivan was carrying someone, struggling with two men trying to hold him back, sitting astride another person, raining punches left and right, eliciting blood and agonizing screams.
Glenn, on the other hand, was overpowered.
The kidney-deficient man was pinned to the ground by two people, taking a beating that already left him looking like a battered pig with a dazed consciousness.
"Wow, looks like people are being bullied onto our doorstep."
Brian silently drew his Glock 17, aiming at a man who stood by with crossed arms, smirking as he watched, "Excuse me, could you tell me what’s going on?"
The crossed-arms man finally noticed Brian walking out of the team leader’s office.
He glanced at Brian’s pistol, a sneer flickering in his eyes, before turning to the woman beside him to ask, "Who is this guy?"