Year 2035

Patrol

Every team consists of five people: a radioman, a driver, and three gunmen. The gunmen sit in the back of the car while the other two, usually a higher rank take the front two seats of the patrol vehicle. I take the seat facing outward on the back end of the Humvee. Abdullah take the passengers seat and sets up the radio. I hope he doesn't try talking to me again. Or like, passive agressively acuse me of being ignorant and unaware of racial issues.

Carter takes the seat next to me. He's never done this before, but he's much calmer than Oscar. There isn't much chatter between our group as we load up. Some of the other groups are yelling at each other and other are trying to phys the group up. Not everyne has a mature perspective on what they do here. Some consider it a purge, two days a year that we can legally kill the rich.

Peters runs past us to his Humvee wooping around, and once he reaches Rodriguez, punches him in the arm in excitement.

"Just you wait man, it's gonna be great," He exclaims, gripping Rodriguez by he shoulers and grostling him back and forth.

"Ok, ok man. Calm down," Rodriguez says, trying to look not to offened while removing Peters' hands. R is a good kick. He's only three years younger than me though. His dad passed away when he was young, and he has a couple of sisters that are younger than him. They're rather poor, I think he might be the lowest precent i our flight, and this job is a goods way to make ends meet, and maybe even a little left over.

I can't say the same for Peters. He's a member of 32% and the fact that he hasn't been discharged is a matter of nepotism. His Dad is one of the higher ups in the OK wing. Peters' is all to excited. He act up just enough to not get booted, but its clear he just enjoys murder.

Thats what it is... muder.

I suddenly realize that I've been staring when Peters and I lock eyes. I dart mine back to the ledge supporting my feet and fidget with the mettal peice of my Bullpup Rifle. Fuck.

"Alright we're out!" Our driver shouts as he bangs the side of the cry.

"Dispatch. Charlie Alfa one nine En route heading West to Penn, destination Rotary Park," Abdullah says into the radio. We start driving bumpy roads of uneven payment, the light fading from the evening side. The cool air of early summer passes over us, and the floodlights fade over the distence. We remain dead silent for nearly half the drive, which could be longer than 15 minutes.

"I know the two of you back there are new," Our driver calls back into the wind. The drivers are a different squardron, their skills and training are much more intence and different from ours. I've never met this driver before. "Don't worry I'm one of the frst people to do this job. There's not much I haven't seen. You need to be ready to asked, but if your preapred, there's no need to worry."

"I'm not scared, Sir!" I call back, "It's not me I'm worried about!" I expected some sort of confirmation, but the Humvee fell silent again. I guess I might have sounded cocky. I'm not scared that I'm going to get hurt, Im worried that I'll have to hurt someone. Of course I know It'll come up evntually, but what if I can't get over it? They're bad people, but the world needs to change. I'm making the sacrifice of being a murder so that no one will be hungry, so that everyone has an oppertunity to learn how to read, and so that everyone has a home, or at least a roof.

The third gunman serves as a lookout. We arive to our sector, which was aptly named Rotary Park, after the park nearby. Driving down the road lined with gas stations and liquor stores, I notice the world looks like after a zombie apololypse. The streets are nearly bare. The people that live here have no reason to fear us, but they know that if someone is harbouring or hiding, they could gte caught up in the crossfire. Its a sign of respect that they stay in thier houses; we fight for them, and they reduce civilian casualties by not getting involved.

We turn into the frist neighborhood. Hugging the side of the road, Scotts, our third gunman, points a large laser at the door of the house to our left. A beep goes off, and then Abdullah gives his a nod of approval. On each door in the neighborhood, there is a code. These are distributed to those who send in thier information to us, so that thier house is registeder in the whitelist system. Originally they didn't use these codes, or even patrol these neighborhoods, but soon they leared that the Privilegded were hiding in homes of those in the lower income areas.

Honestly, I have such a hard time with people like that, selling out to the enemy beacuse they some cash fast. I heard that some Priv are willing to pay a family over $5,000 just to stay in thier house. Honestly I'm surprised that it isn't higher, but I guess they have plenty of people they could go to is they tink the price is too high. Theres always another pawn shop.

After a code checks out in the system we just drive to the next house, and repeat the process all over again, turn around, and so on. The constant starting and stoping of the car is a little annnoying, but if you lean into it and just keep reminding yourself that alternitively you could have to kill someone, you can get used to it.

"You know, its not that bad," Carter says quietly, trying not to disturb Scotts and Abdullah. "It's kinda nice out... Quiet... you can really think."

"Yeah I guess," I umble back, "It jus feels kinda dead to me... and the energy... I've never been outside when this was happening before. My mother would always put the  code up, lock the doors, and try to distract us. My father... He used to do this... it wasn't easy."

I guess I made Carter feel bad because he didn;t want to talk anymore. he's right though, you can reall think out here. I guess that's why I got carried away in my answer. I didn't mean to shut him down, but I'm not in the mood to talk anyways so I just leave it.

"Hang on," Abdullah says sternly. "That one's not in the system."

Oh fuck.