Trigger Warning : Suicidal Ideation

The rank smell of blood filled the air. Officer Collins watched as big red splotches drenched through his workjacket and wet his primary chest shield.

Ah fuck. This would be the third jacket spoiled by someone spilling their guts out.

The earceptor crackled behind him. Too far for him to answer from where he was trapped on the ground. Too lazy to push off the 90kg corpse sprawled on his body.

The earceptor changed frequency to transmit a distress signal. The shrill droning hurt his ears. Collins sighed.

Today was a real bad day.

Even by his meagre standards.

Collins is an easily pleased man. A breakfast, clean workclothes and a low radiation forecast gives enough spring in his step to not think of blowing his head off by noontime.

But what with today's ration running out, clothes getting drained in possibly nukey blood and the dense white fog, he felt like ripping his mask out and writing a pretty note for his bereaving family.

He brought his free left hand to check his mask. Still online, no cracks. Well, atleast that's a bright spot. Except he couldn't care about an extra bright spot when he could die in less than a week from now.

The whirring blades of the incoming assessor droid interrupted his flow of thought, and he braced for their impact.

The unhandled droid landed with a resonant thud, on top of the corpse's thigh, shattering it in two. The drone turned its screen towards him.

"Identity verified. Officer Wendell Collins of Squad 546, MPD."

"Confirmed."

The drone monitor scanned the corpse.

"Identity verified. Lee Jonathan, convicted felon. Cause of death : Acute Radiation Poisoning."

"Bastard forgot to wear his mask while escaping the gallows."

The droid said nothing. Of course it said nothing.

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

"Officer Collins, you are in threat of ARS due to exposure to radioactive blood. Allow me to escort you to the nearest decontamination center."

Wasn't this day bad enough already?

.

.

.

.

.

After three hours of scrubbing and soaking in decontaminants, Collins was let go with six ampules of CRS and a leave grant of two days. He would need it. Cell Repair Serum always left him weak in the joints and sick in the stomach. His mask was programmed to a slightly higher filter rate for a week and he was told to increase the oxygen concentration in his room.

Expensive...but, so is life.

Expensive and not worth living. Isn't now, never was and never will be.

How many more days till he finally kicks the bucket? The writing desk is filled with suicide notes. The shrink told him they're not going to help, but what the hell, it made life slightly more exciting.

A droid shrink couldn't stop him anyway. A real shrink wouldn't be affordable. Plus, there wasn't anybody who would miss him if he didn't turn up to work next day. Nobody except the government.

The only problem was that he cared too much about the process. Or he kept procrastinating D-Day, looking for an excuse to live. Officer Collins was a man who was easy to please. Any excuse, however stupid, would do. But he couldn't find any just now.

The last D-day he scheduled was due next week. Maybe he could put it in for today. Since its been a shitty day anyway.

His stomach grumbled, and he gave a lopsided grin.

Lets see how far I can think while on a drink.

He stopped at a vendor machine, bought some Soylent.

Maybe I could jump off a building? How about Capitol Towers?

He poked through the bottle axis with an o-poly straw.

Nah, he would be caught as fast as you could say boom.

Or he could hang himself in his room. With a red twined rope and an illegal book in his breastpocket.

Vive la revolution written with his blood on the walls.

He sucked in the vanilla flavoured slurry, satisfied . Imagine the headlines. 'Former officer of MPD involved in Anarchist Movement?', 'Scandal at the MPD', 'MPD and the Anarchy Links Investigated', 'Anarchist Suicide provokes Mass hysteria'.

A death that would atleast entertain. A death that didnt involve spitting blood and vomit on people minding their own business. A death that would...

A small sliver of gold caught his eye as he walked dreamily through the shops on the sidewalk.

He stopped. And stared.

A flower.

A blooming daffodil flower in the blood shone brightly on the other side of the window.

He had colored in printed daffodils with his crayons back in elementary. He had written about daffodils in his endangered and extinct plant essay. He had read an illegal poem about thousands of daffodils stretched in a field, under a lonely wandering cloud of an extinct clear blue sky.

He looked in hastily through the window. A short, freckled redhead shopkeeper stared back at him, looking just as awkward as he felt.

He felt an ancient urge to grab the flowers and shower it with love at home. To grow a thousand of the flowers in his living room, and wander lonely upon them. He grabbed his rationbook. Surely he must have something left of his luxury ration?

This month's luxury ration was empty.

He let out a small smile despite his bitter disappointment. A weak fire ignited within. The redhead smiled shyly at him. He could only shrug his shoulders and walk away.

"Hannah's Flowers", he mumbled to himself, and saved the coordinates on his phone.

Oh well. Gotta slug hard for those flowers.

He resolved to move D-day to the next month.