Part 3: Conservation

The intruder didn’t look like a bugler. He was tall with neatly trimmed, graying hair, and a obviously expensive 3 piece suit. If his stride hadn’t been so confidant, Les would have thought he was lost. What reason could there be for a man like that wandering a shipping warehouse at 2:00 AM? As procedure demanded, Les had called the main security office upon first alarm. The controller kept him on the line. They had linked into the security cameras, and could see what he was seeing while they fed him status updates for the arrival of police and backup. While help was still 2 minutes away, the man on the screen reached into his satchel, and drew out a bottle. It was more than a handful, maybe a wine or liquor bottle. Perhaps the man was indeed just a vagabond looking for a dark place to lay his head while he drank himself into a coma.

Les’ idle speculation screeched to a halt as the image on the monitor paled in the light of a naked flame. A rag stuffed into the bottle’s neck was lit, and the intruder reared his arm back and threw. The bottle glanced off the concrete floor, and slid into a pallet of cardboard boxes. Any momentary relief Les felt when the bottle refused to shatter was snuffed when the fire wrapped around the boxes. Les grabbed an auxiliary phone and dialed 999.

The line rang only once before he got an answer. Quickly explained there was a fire and gave over the address. The operator asked, “Are you still in the building, sir?” And when he replied she calmly instructed, “There’s nothing more you can do there. Please evacuate.” The monitor showed only fire and shadow. He could smell the chemical laden smoke, and for a moment he wondered what his employer would do if he left his post, but quickly decided that it didn’t matter.

* * *

“There’s only one place in town that has any elixir left, and they’re demanding two-thousand euro a dose, or twenty-thousand for a contract.” Courtney Phearson took a deranged delight in watching her bosses’ jaw go slack. Generally her boss was unflappable, but over the past months the world had become an unbelievable place.

“That’s absurd,” Archibald replied, “the only reason the supply in London is so strained is because of the mob attacks and hijacking. Do they think people will pay that?”

“First,” Courtney explained, “I’d bet a pretty penny that the pharmacy is a mob operation, and they’re just culling they competition to drive prices, and second, people are paying those prices. Not many, sure, but every dollar they get will go to fighting other suppliers, and the longer this goes, the more people are going to decide to either pay their price or leave.”

Dr Mercer’s head slumped, but she knew him well enough to know that he couldn’t spare the strength to lift his head when his mind was working its hardest.

“Why don’t people mail-order elixir?”

“Some stupid law enacted last year that prohibits sending medicines to private residence through the mail. It was conceived to combat all those stupid untested diet supplements and internet frauds.”

His mouth twitched, but he continued thinking, “Well, we can’t do a lot about London, but we should consider keeping the same from happening here. We’ll need to make elixir a controlled substance, and ensure only licensed pharmacies sell it, and it’s sold only to persons with a prescription, and limit the amounts that can be sold per person to prevent hording.”

As two of the heads of The Department of Human Health and Continuation, they had the clout to do just that, but Courtney worried. “Will people accept it? I mean, Dr Rayne Osi meant for elixir to be freely available to anyone who wants it.”

“But it’s not available,” Archibald replied, “Not in London. And in this case, the mob is right. This stuff is valuable. It’s family, it’s the future, and the continuation of the species relies upon it. If they could control the supply of elixir, how much could they charge? What would cost too much to the people who wanted it?”

She spent several seconds coming to agree with him. If they didn’t control the elixir, who did? “It’ll be hard to get the Senate to pass these restrictions, it’ll upset the voters, and won’t make anyone rich; you know how politicians resist such things.” As soon as she said it, Courtney cringed. Archibald was no small part politician himself. He didn’t seem to notice the unintended slight however.

“No, it won’t, but it will be done anyway.”