FICTION: The Floral Courier

The man held a bouquet of flowers. They were wrapped tightly in plastic, and his expression was sad but serious. He was a delivery man for the Superior Nine International Florist Federation and his latest delivery was taking him to a usual haunt - a hospital. He was dressed in a sharp suit, a name badge simply reading the word "Floral Courier." Names were not important for his work.

It was night time, and the plastic surrounding the flowers carried condensation. The condensation carried the reflection of the ambient lighting in the plaza. A neon sign glowed out the message "Opening soon", against the cafe window as he approached the sliding doors adjacent. They slid open to the quiet hospital lobby.

He took a face mask from the display near the door, adjusted it, and looked toward the elevator. He referred to the number wrapped around the stalks of the flowers. 337-L5. The elevator arrived with a quiet ding, and the aroma of antibacterial cleaning agent and bleach wafted past his mask as he entered. It overwhelmed what little aroma the flowers might carry.

He pressed the number five.

The yellow light surrounding the button pulsed in a gentle, comforting manner, like undiagnosed jaundice. The elevator ambulated him up the the vertical shaft, toward his goal.

The hallway was dark when the elevator doors opened, and the flowers in his bouquet were a beacon that captured all of the light as he strode toward the 337. Lights, triggered by motion sensors, clacked on as he progressed down the hard, clinical tiles of the corridor.

Loud machines punctuated the foot falls of his formal shoes, beeping in concert with the squeaking of traction on each step.

It was louder as he approached 337, as loud as whispers could be. Some quiet snoring was heard from rooms alongside. A medical professional was comforting a woman in 337.

Behind, a bed, a cloth, and the form of a human being covered head to toe. Another dead one, another night for the corpse driver. Maybe he'd say hello on the way out.

The medical professional looked up and locked eyes upon the delivery man as he arrived. Behind the mask, the medical professional smiled, and his gaze moved down to the bouquet. A rapid transition from "hello" to horror as the man offered the flowers to what he understood to be a grieving widow his hand clad in a white latex glove.

The medical professional reached for the duress alarm. A quiet alert was sent. Perhaps it would have been more efficient to deliver the targeted agent through the ventilation system, but his employers had wanted them to know that it was them.