Former narc officer fights drug war(3)

"Tian Hao, you were my best cadet. I never imagined I would be arrested by you," the man said.

Tian says: "I am not sure what happened to him. But we found 6 kilograms of heroin on him. I can't imagine he survived that."

Off duty, Tian would sometimes visit drug addicts' families. "I never saw a rehabilitated drug addict who could really stay off drugs during my five years in Yunnan," he says.

An essential condition for rehabilitation is a drug-free environment, which is impossible near the border.

The narcotics team suggested to everyone in the area to write a will. Tian rewrote his frequently.

The first comrade he lost was a veteran soldier who was due to go home four months later. He had been chasing a suspect who jumped off a 20-meter-high bridge into a river. The soldier jumped after him.

When the old soldier's body was pulled out of the water, Tian thought: "He told me not to jump into rivers, but he did it himself."

The soldier's family came and cried beside the body. Tian wondered if one day, it would be his family.

His work was a secret to his family until his mother saw him on television news. She became depressed and urged him to leave the narcotics department.

Tian retired, but he had few academic qualifications or social survival skills. He now does different part-time jobs and lives with his mother.

His fans on "zhihu" brighten his life. Publishers have asked him to adapt his comments into a book.

"Drug addicts and drug traffickers have every reason to take drugs," he says. "I would like to use my story to help people stay away from them."