Detective Sarah Hauser of the Johannesburg Metropolitan Police Department sighed deeply as she watched the medical tech zip up the body bag. There goes another one, she thought grimly. The body belonged to Claire Adewale, a Nigerian-born and Oxford-educated businesswoman working for Excelsior Enterprises here in Gauteng. Just like all the others, Adewale's body was found drained of blood. The latest in a string of murders that The Star newspaper dubbed "The Vampire Murders."
Standing five feet eleven inches tall while barefoot, lean and athletic, with blonde hair and blue eyes, Sarah Hauser was used to people dismissing her because of her looks. Barely out of her twenties, she was the youngest detective in all of Johannesburg. Many attributed this to her gender, and her skin color. The truth was far simpler than that. Sarah loved being a cop, and worked hard at it.
"I hate to say it but we might have a vampire on our hands," said her colleague, Detective Bezile "Bee-Man" Nogubaza. The tall, broad-shouldered and dark-skinned Xhosa cop looked worn out in his Black vest, blue silk shirt, Black silk pants and cowboy boots. Although his Black hair was more salt than pepper these days, Bee-Man usually looked like he meant business. Tonight, he looked beat.
Even though Detective Bezile Nogubaza had been a street cop longer than Sarah Hauser had been alive, the elder detective carried himself like a younger man, always spry in his movements and quick-witted, and his biting sense of humor was often a relief to her on a stressful day. Today was definitely not such a day.
"Bee, the last thing we want is for people to start panicking," Sarah said wistfully, and Bee-Man shrugged casually. Even though he acted nonchalant, Sarah could tell that something was bothering him. Bezile was the most secretive man she'd ever known, only revealing bits and pieces of his past in the three years they'd been working together.
According to department records, Bezile "Bee-Man" Nogubaza was born in Soweto in 1990, a few years before Apartheid officially ended in the Republic of South Africa. Cadet Bezile Nogubaza joined the police force in 2017, a few years before the world discovered the existence of supernatural entities such as vampires, those kinds of creatures that went bump in the night.
"No one's seen a vampire outside of the Quarantine Zone in years and the world has been all the better for it," Bee-Man said, and involuntarily shuddered. Sarah knew that the older cop had been on the frontlines of the global war against the supernatural which began in 2020, the year an ancient vampire named Cassius Magnus, led the Undead in an attempt to take over New York City.
Thousands of policemen and soldiers lost their lives, as did untold number of civilians, as Cassius Magnus mass-converted half of New York City by infecting them with an airborne variant of the vampire virus. Millions of ordinary American men, women and children fell comatose, only to rise as bloodthirsty nightmares seventy two hours later. Thus, the vampire wars began.
"Glad I didn't live in those days," Sarah said, looking into the distance. The bright lights of Johannesburg, her native town, and the crown jewel of the integrated Republic of South Africa shone in the background. Ever since the mid-2030s, South Africa had become the world's leading superpower. Only Brazil and Saudi Arabia came close to rival them economically or militarily.
The United States of America and Canada had been reduced to third world countries as their respective governments used their nuclear weapons in failed attempts at containing the vampire threat. Europe was currently considered a Black hole, and the continent was still part of the Quarantine Zone, which expanded to include Turkey as of five years ago.
"Wish I could say the same," Bee-Man said, the rising anger in his voice somewhat startling Sarah. Usually, Bee-Man was cool as ice. Nothing got to him. This case apparently did, and it most definitely worried the hell out of a certain rookie cop.
After graduating from the Faculty of Law at the University of Johannesburg in June 2047, 25-year-old Sarah Hauser, the only daughter of legendary South African civil rights attorneys and anti-Apartheid activists Anneke and Jonathan Hauser, stunned her family by deciding to join the police force.
The Hauser family vehemently opposed their daughter's choice of career, in light of the fact that policing worldwide had become more dangerous due to cops having to fight monsters nowadays, instead of ordinary criminals. The day Sarah Hauser graduated from the police academy, one of her instructors, George Majalamba, introduced her to legendary local cop Bee-Man, her future partner, who took her under his wing, and her life hadn't been the same since.
Early on in their partnership, the Xhosa cop and the young Afrikaner woman bonded, in more ways than one. Even decades after President Nelson Mandela's election marked the end of Apartheid, certain things were considered taboo in South Africa. Interracial couples weren't exactly uncommon in Johannesburg. Lots of local Chinese men and Indian men married Black women, and quite a few White men married Black women as well. Yet the sight of a Black man with a White woman always caused some people to do a double take. That's just the way of things in South Africa, unfortunately.
"I'll submit my report to the Chief of Detectives and head on home now," Sarah said, looking intently at Bee-Man, who shrugged casually, much to her chagrin. Sometimes Sarah honestly felt like strangling him. Some acknowledgement, was that too much to ask?
Being cool as ice and utterly emotionless was a remarkable quality in a policeman but a pretty lousy attribute in a boyfriend. Any woman would tell you that. What made Bee-Man one of the top cops in all of South Africa also infuriated the hell out of the young woman who loved him.
"Don't wait up," Bee-Man called, over his shoulder, and Sarah groaned but said nothing. Heading for her car, the young policewoman drove away. An hour later, having turned her in report, and showered, Sarah Hauser walked out of the police station in her street clothes, a red T-shirt and blue jeans. Casually she walked to the nearby train station.
"I don't even know why I bother with you sometime," Sarah said, pulling out her Holo-Phone and looking at the picture of her and Bee-Man in shorts, drinking ice cream, at the annual Police Picnic last summer. They sure looked happy in that picture. In an uncharacteristic public display of affection, Bee-Man had his arm around her waist.
"Bastard," Sarah said, and turned off the transmission. Her holographic phone vanished into the ether. The train came, and she got on. As usual, at this time of night, the train was packed. A burly Black guy with tribal tattoos, Zulu by the looks of him, held hands with a petite Asian woman. The two of them looked very much into each other.
A man who isn't afraid to show his feelings, Sarah thought darkly, and pulled a book out of her purse. Although most people only dealt with E-books these days, Sarah was old-fashioned. The venerable Johannesburg City Library on Market and Fraser Street still stood, and Sarah still went there once a week to borrow books. These days she was reading the novel Meant To Be, by Jeanne Sumerix. The story of an African-American man and a White American woman who fall in love in rural Michigan.
