Logbook of a coffee trafficker.

Martin's log

January 27, 2120.

This may be my last mission, things have worsened in recent years, this journey is becoming more and more dangerous. I was born into a family fully dedicated to coffee trafficking, since I was 13 years old I started doing small jobs for my grandfather, who was the energetic leader of this clandestine organization. In all these years it is the first time that I ask myself if all this is worth it.

Last night I was attacked by a group of Cafetaleros, long ago that word would have meant something else, nowadays the Cafetaleros are people who developed a strong addiction for coffee, and now they suffer their abstinence like the living dead. Coffee is consumed clandestinely, as cocaine or heroin was consumed long ago, its consumers are social scum, they live in the streets, they steal and kill in exchange for, at least, a small dose of their favorite drug, they do not seem human.

My family is in charge of producing, processing, packaging and moving this black gold. But in the market there are other producing and distributing families, which add difficulty to our business, since we also have to deal with the cleaning brigades of the state, and the living dead that smell us from miles away, we live in a war.

February 3, 2120.

I wonder, how I ended up being a mule, all the male members of my family occupy a place in the administrative head, the women are in charge of the field. For the traffic always had poor people, without economic possibilities, my grandfather and my father looked for in the worst neighborhoods the boys without future to carry out this work. But I, I was born cursed, my physical and intellectual abilities made my grandfather designate me this responsibility. Since I was a child I learned the coffee routes by heart, fast, stealthy and strong, all this made me the best mule that the family business has had in so many years.

This is a very dangerous job, not only because I run a high risk of dying in each transfer, I have also had to kill. I have killed and disappeared mules and other members of enemy families, other times I have done it with agents of the state cleaning brigades, I am a killer. If an undead finds you, it devours your merchandise and your flesh, so many years in the coffee business makes our skin quite attractive to these beings, you don't live to tell the tale. My grandfather could have ignored my gifts, left me at headquarters, safe from all this, but he and my father are only interested in business.

Before it was not like that, people consumed coffee every day, it was very common in breakfasts and snacks, it also served as a meeting point, there were places called "Cafeterias" where people gathered to drink it and share. But things changed, in the year 2022 the big coffee monopolies hired Monsanto to alter the genetics of their beans, they wanted to increase the degree of addiction caused by caffeine, in order to increase consumption levels and profits.

At the beginning it was a marvel, the numbers went up while people consumed a much more delicious product than before, happiness for all. The hegemony of coffee was imposed on the market, through political corruption, the coffee businessmen managed to have it decreed as a mandatory product. It was offered in schools to children and free of charge to pregnant women, in order to develop addiction from the embryonic stage. Environmentalist groups were attached to self-cultivation and protected the native seed, all of them were assassinated.

The business was running smoothly, but the side effects soon became apparent. Before the genetic intervention, the most that could happen to you if you did not drink coffee, was a headache and a little sleepiness, under the coffee tyranny and its mutant grains, not drinking coffee could cause sudden death, severe and prolonged dementia, people became extremely violent and self-destructive. There are records of people who gouged out their eyes or their flesh, others murdered their entire family, chaos broke out, monopolies drowned trying to silence the media and politicians began to regret their decision.

One day there was no other option, the state decreed the consumption of coffee illegal, as well as its production and sale. The monopolies went bankrupt, but another millionaire business was born from the ashes, the illegal production and sale, there was my grandfather's father, an enterprising young man who took advantage of the context to become one of the richest and most wanted mafiosos of the coffee traffic.

February 6th, 2120.

It took me 10 days to get here, I delivered the shipment and they gave me lodging, tomorrow I will continue my journey through this unfortunate clandestine route, I have to make another delivery. I hope to die on the way, fall into the clutches of the undead and quench their thirst and hunger, I can't do this anymore. I can't betray my family, they are counting on me, I hope to die because otherwise, I will remain a mule. There is a positive side, tomorrow when the sun rises, thousands of people will pour a cup of coffee on the sly and calm their anxiety for a while, their eyes will shine and their hands will be sheltered by its warmth, they will breathe deeply near the steaming cup and that miracle will be possible thanks to us, the traffickers, the servants of Coffee, the god of this new world.