Vaccinators

I watched from cover as the troops made their move, in short dashes from doorway to doorway. They were obviously professionals.

The coffee shop was full of hipsters, men with impressive, oiled beards and recycled clothes; women in flannel shirts and ripped jeans and fake 1950s glasses. Their children were all dressed in cute, faded denim dungarees and tiny hiking boots. We had hit the jackpot.

On the sergeant's signal, the men fired baton rounds first... inert rubbery pellets about the size of D cell batteries, breaking the windows and allowing the men a clear field of fire.

The next volley was an almost silent flight of tiny, winged darts, each carrying a polyvalent vaccine payload. The empty box at my feet said it covered measles, pertussis, rubella, mumps, polio, chickenpox and a number of other potentially deadly viruses.

Two more volleys and it was done. The troops moved in, gathered up their spent syringes, handed out packets of jellybeans and gummy bears and exfiltrated quickly, melting into the shadows and piling back into their cargo van, which was disguised as a mobile barista training school.

I glanced at the monitor behind the driver's seat. We had three more hotspots to clean up before lunchtime; including a small homeschoolers' convention.