The Inspector

The hologram, displayed a squat woman, chin tilted up in defiance. She wore dark slacks and a short-sleeved top. Thick curls pushed out from beneath her peaked cap. Emblazoned upon the base was the Inspector’s Credo.

“Marshall the inconsequential in service to the consequential.”

The hologram could be found in the subterranean warrens beneath the ruins of every major city about the globe. Every citizen knew the Inspector’s Credo. Solace and strength were found in her words.

The world had torn itself apart, warring desperately over resources when The Great Warming had become irreversible. Mankind moved underground to survive.

It had been in that time before, when the Chief Scientist had encountered her. He had stepped out of the elevator toward his conveyance, which hovered in the stack of vehicles. A parking inspector had just scanned its barcode.

“I’m here!” he called.

“Too late.”

“The world burns and you’re ticketing me for a parking violation?” the Chief Scientist said.

“My grandpa was fond of saying, ‘Watch the pennies and the dollars will take care of themselves.’ ”

“What does that mean?”

“An expired parking term might seem irrelevant to you,” she replied, “but we have to look to the little things if we expect to have any hope for managing the big things.”

It was then that the Chief Scientist determined to redirect his research toward microbes and the genes from the globe’s hardiest species as a means of enhancing human biology. Humanity would survive this extermination.