Aethervex

Chapter 1

Fever

“We have something new from India,” Mike said as he entered Sandy’s office.

Sandy looked up from her paperwork concerning progress on the respiratory syncytial virus vaccine, “Something new?” she asked, intrigued.

“Yes,” Mike said, “Patrick already took a look at it.”

Sandy rolled her eyes, “Of course Patrick knew about it before I did. Is it a virus?”

“Looks like it,” Mike said, “It could be big.”

“You say that about a lot of things,” Sandy said, “It’s rarely a big deal.”

“What about COVID-19?” Mike asked, “I was right about that.”

“Don’t use that card,” Sandy said, “Everyone could tell that COVID-19 would be a big deal.”

“Yeah, but I knew about it before the public did.”

“Whatever,” Sandy said, trying to move on, “Do we have a name for it yet?”

“Just a bunch of confusing letters and numbers,” Mike said, “I’ll let you know if they come up with an official name.”

“Get me a sample,” Sandy said.

“Did I mention that it’s in India?” Mike said, “It might take a while to get a sample for this one.”

“That’s okay,” Sandy said, “I just want a quick look at it. Every new virus teaches me something I don’t already know.”

Mike nodded, “Good luck on that vaccine, by the way.”

Sandy glanced back at her paperwork, “Oh, Thanks,” she said with a smile, “It’s a frustrating project.”

“You know your hours ended ten minutes ago, right?” Mike asked, “Unless there’s a secret privilege that nobody is telling me about, we don’t get paid for overtime work.”

“I know,” Sandy said, “But I’m almost done with this stack of paper, and I don’t really have much else planned for the day.”

Mike nodded and stepped out of the room without making another comment.

Sandy sighed, focusing on her work again. She wrote a few signatures, ordering the necessary resources for her next batch of experiments, then spent some more time researching the respiratory syncytial virus.

After another half hour, Sandy packed up her things and left the biotechnology corporation headquarters. She passed by Patrick’s office on the way, glancing inside to see if he was working on yet another simple project just to get the recognition once it was completed. Sandy always felt like Patrick took shortcuts and focused on simple tasks, caring more about the recognition more than the biotechnological advancements. Everyone in the company seemed to look up to him, even though he never worked as tirelessly as Sandy did.

Deep down, though, Sandy was jealous of Patrick and his accomplishments. She avoided the easy work because she wanted to make a real difference in the world, but that caused her to attempt impossible tasks and go nowhere.

Sandy sighed and continued walking out the front door. She searched the parking lot for her car, then got in and drove off.

A few minutes later, Sandy arrived at her sister’s house where her two kids were playing with dominoes. Her sister, Amanda, was kind enough to babysit the two troublemakers while she was at work, and for that, she was incredibly grateful.

When she stepped through the front door, Ascher screamed with joy and tried standing up. The toddler, who had just turned one last month, wobbled on his legs and focused on his balance before waddling over to hug his mother’s leg.

Sandy’s four-year-old daughter was too focused on her masterful creation. A large portion of the living room was filled with dominoes standing straight up in a long twisting line. She had even created a staircase with books that led the dominoes up onto the TV stand and back down. Every few feet, there was a significant gap between the dominoes to prevent the entire thing from being ruined from one mistake.

Sandy picked up Ascher and gave him a kiss on the forehead, then seated him on her right forearm and carefully stepped over the dominoes to get a closer look at Valerie’s project. She was currently trying to build a tower of dominoes that would topple over at the end of the line. It looked like the grand finale.

“Hey pumpkin,” Sandy said, “Are you having fun?”

“Don’t speak,” Valerie said in her serious but adorable voice, “You’ll knock over the tower.”

Sandy laughed, “You silly girl. Good job putting spaces in the line. If you mess up, the whole thing won’t fall over. That’s smart.”

“I don’t mess up, mom,” Valerie said as if it were obvious, “Ascher kept knocking stuff over.”

Sandy laughed again, then turned to see Amanda walk into the room from the kitchen. She was holding a small plate of fresh cookies.

“Your daughter’s a genius, I’m telling you,” Amanda said, “I keep trying to tell her, but she’s too focused on her work.”

“That sounds like Val,” Sandy grinned.

Finally, Valerie finished the tower and immediately started filling in the gaps she left throughout the trail. She stuck her tongue out while she worked, as if it helped her focus.

“Is it done?” Sandy asked, “Are you gonna knock it over?”

“No!” Valerie said forcefully, “That would mess it up!”

“But that’s what dominoes do,” Sandy said, “You knock them over when you’re done so you can watch it.”

“No,” Valerie said again, “I like it more when they stand up.”

“Good job, honey,” Amanda said to Valerie, handing her a cookie.

“How often do you give them cookies?” Sandy asked with a worried tone.

“Relax,” Amanda said, “I know you’re a health freak, but a cookie every once in a while can’t hurt. It doesn’t happen every day, I promise.”

Sandy wanted to continue the debate, but her sister was probably right. She could let it pass this time, turning back to Valerie.

“You should probably clean up the dominoes,” Sandy said, “They can’t be here forever.”

“No!” Valerie screamed. Sandy was about to try explaining why the dominoes should be cleaned and put away, but Amanda cut in again.

“I never use this room by myself,” Amanda said, “I’ll do my best to keep the dominoes up until she gets back.”

“Okay,” Sandy said, “It looks like you win this time, Val. Amanda’s gonna keep your dominoes safe till next time.”

“Yay!” Valerie said, changing attitudes in a split second. She immediately started pulling on her boots and getting ready to go.

Sandy took her kids home, and the rest of the day was pretty mundane. They had leftover spaghetti for dinner, played some games and watched a movie until the children fell asleep around eight o’clock. She turned off the screen, brought them to bed, tucked them in, then continued working in her home office.

Unlike Patrick and most of Sandy’s coworkers, Sandy spent extra time at home each day studying and working on her projects. Some nights, she stayed up for hours reading reports or studying viruses of the past. Today, however, her extra work didn’t seem to have any progress, so she went to bed.

Even though it was unhealthy, Sandy checked her phone right before falling asleep, finding one new text message from Mike. With curiosity, Sandy unlocked her phone and read the message:

“Remember that new virus in India?” the message said, “People are calling it vex fever. It’s already breaking records.”

Chapter 2

Symptoms

The next day, Sandy dropped her kids off at Amanda’s house and went to work early. Thankfully, the doors were unlocked at four AM each day, so she didn’t have to worry about getting in. For a while, there weren’t any other people around her office, so she was working with peace and silence.

All of Sandy’s work regarding RSV was pushed to the side for now. She was focused on her new, temporary project. She wanted to be the first virologist to identify key features of vex fever. She wanted to be credited with the virus’s vaccine. And most of all, she wanted to do it before Patrick was able to. It’s not that Sandy wanted Patrick to fail, she just wanted to be recognized for once.

Based on the reports that Sandy was watching carefully and repetitively, people with vex fevers in India had dangerously high body temperatures, bloody coughs, and soreness in various places. It wasn’t identified as lethal yet, since nobody had actually died from it. People who had it, however, were getting very sick, regardless of their age or state of health.

Three days after the virus had been identified, it had been reported in sixteen different cities. Sandy assumed that there were several more cities not included in that report, since many of the cities in India were without sufficient technology. Also, there were obviously several people who caught the virus and weren’t reported, so the numbers weren’t accurate.

While Sandy caught up on previously recorded reports and written messages, she took notes as fast as her fingers could write. She was determined to figure this one out in as little time as possible. After reading and watching several messages and videos, she started watching live reports concerning vex fever.

The vast majority of the planet still didn’t know vex fever existed. It was announced as an epidemic in India, but definitely not a pandemic. Based on its spreading rates and symptoms, though, Sandy guessed that her coworker, Mike, was right about this one eventually becoming a big deal.

The world had just experienced the destructive effects of the COVID-19 pandemic just over ten years ago, so the thought of a pandemic was fresh in most people’s minds. Sandy was still in college at that time, so she wasn’t able to help very much with the development of the vaccines. The more she learned about vex fever, though, the more concerned she became for the world. Hopefully, the lessons learned during the recent pandemic would allow people to handle this one more easily, assuming it came to that point.

The information on the news was advancing at a surprisingly fast face while Sandy watched carefully. Her coworkers started arriving and going about their normal business. Most of them probably didn’t even know about vex fever yet, but they would likely figure out about it today. One of the main goals of the company was to track new diseases and create vaccines, cures, or advice to fight it off and stay healthy.

Mike walked into Sandy’s office and immediately stopped to notice her absurd amount of written notes and the live reports she had displayed on her desktop.

“I was going to ask you if you had any plans for vex fever,” Mike said, “But it looks like you’ve already learned everything about it so far.”

“Everything the reports have to offer,” Sandy said, pausing the video on her screen, “But I really need a sample to study myself. This virus has a unique behavior compared to most viruses today and in the past. Nobody seems to know how it spreads, but I’ve been listening carefully to each report and description of the sickness, and I’m pretty sure it’s airborne.”

Mike inhaled sharply through his teeth, “Airborne viruses are nasty.”

“My best guess is that it’s some sort of enterovirus,” Sandy said, starting to ramble on about what’s been on her mind, “Like the acute flaccid myelitis virus. It causes soreness, though, which confuses me. The more recent reports this morning have also confirmed diarrhea as a symptom of vex fever, but that also confuses me, since it wasn’t a symptom yesterday. It’s as if everyone with vex fever suddenly started having troubles with their fecal route.”

“Weird,” Mike said, “How many confirmed deaths have there been?”

“None, as far as I know,” Sandy said, “But that doesn’t surprise me. It seems like it could be a lethal disease, but a slow killer. Several weak or elderly people have had the sickness for at least three days, but are still alive, trying to fight it off.”

“Well I’m glad someone’s obsessed with all this,” Mike said, “Because it could become the next big pandemic. Its viral patterns are even worse than COVID.”

“I know,” Sandy said, “That’s one of the reasons I’ve been working so hard. It’s honestly pretty scary.”

Mike shrugged, “After seeing all these scribbles, I’ll admit that you’re a nerd, but your nerdiness could save the world someday. You never know.”

Sandy laughed, “My notes aren’t scribbles. I have good handwriting, don’t I?”

“It looks like you have the capabilities of good penmanship, but you’re writing too quickly, so your letters all mush together.”

Sandy glanced down at her notes. After noticing that Mike was right, she just shrugged and decided not to care anymore. “Thanks for checking in on me, Mike,” she said, “I should probably get back to this, though. I’m trying to stay caught up with the reports.”

Mike nodded once, then left the room. Sandy started the video again, then turned back to her notes, only slightly self-conscious about her handwriting.

Throughout the rest of her day at work, nobody else bothered Sandy. She never stopped focusing all her attention on the information in front of her.

The reports on vex fever weren’t usually boring. The virus was spreading so quickly that the news was constantly changing. Every couple hours, a new city would report cases of the sickness, but nobody died. Using educated guessing, Sandy concluded that victims of the virus showed significant symptoms within one day of the virus entering their system. Unlike COVID-19, this would allow for easier tracking and quarantining, but more dramatic spreading patterns. It was obviously highly contagious and could most likely travel far distances through the air.

Sandy also predicted that vex fever would survive better in warm weather, since it originated in a warm place. Hopefully, it wouldn’t be able to survive or spread as easily in cold weather. If that were the case, it wouldn’t become much of a problem in many places.

Most of Sandy’s notes ended up being useless, as they were just random speculations and comments from reporters that she thought might become useful later. Eventually, she stopped listening to the speculations and random comments from citizens, and stuck with the professional documents and reports.

Before Sandy packed up her things at the end of the day, the final report she watched provided some of the most curious information she had seen so far. Sandy had kept a list of confirmed and possible symptoms for vex fever, but a new symptom seemed to emerge out of nowhere. Suddenly, everyone with vex fever reported having serious heartburn and stomach aches.

Sandy knew that diseases could evolve and symptoms could change over time, but she had been paying very close attention to every report, and there had not been any accounts of stomach or esophageal pain. Plus, heartburn was a very rare symptom for diseases in general. The only illness she could think of that commonly caused heartburn was gastroesophageal reflux disease, and that was literally an esophageal disease.

Even though Sandy wanted to continue her research, she had to leave the office and pick up her children at Amanda’s house again. Since India had a different day and night cycle than New York, more people in India would be awake while Sandy was at home or asleep. She felt like she would miss a lot of important information, but there was nothing she could do about it.

Despite her frustration, Sandy left the biotechnology corporation headquarters and did her best to enjoy the rest of her day. Valerie’s friend had a birthday party that she went to, and Ascher took a good long nap for the first time in a while, so it became a pretty relaxing day for Sandy. Several times, she was tempted to do more research, but she decided to get some rest instead. If she was right about vex fever becoming the next worldwide pandemic, she would start working tirelessly for at least a few weeks.

Sandy woke up from a nap near the end of the day, brought Ascher with her to pick up Valerie at the party, then went back home and continued the rest of her day normally. When her two children went to bed, she almost got back on her laptop to do more research, but she decided against it and went to bed early that night.

Chapter 3

Dwindling Time

Sandy’s extra sleep and rest paid off. Over the next three days, everything changed dramatically. The virus spread across India, China, and several other countries. There had even been some reports of vex fever in Australia and Europe, but nothing in the United States yet.

The symptoms of vex fever were incredibly inconsistent. Sometimes people had cramps and soreness. Sometimes they had headaches and dizziness. Sometimes they had diarrhea and indigestion. Just about every symptom of illness imaginable was present in vex fever at some point. The disease caused a lot of misery to those who got sick, but it didn’t seem to go away. Only a few deaths were reported, but they were always from high risk people.

Sandy worked hard every day, taking a ridiculous amount of notes as she learned everything she could, refining her notes into carefully thought-out articles, then submitting those articles to her company and the government. Her coworkers rarely spoke to her, but she could tell that they were all a little shocked at her persistence.

Every evening, Sandy did her best to spend time with her children, but the demand for her research and work was so high that she occasionally had to do extra work at home.

The whole world quickly became aware of the virus, and it caused a lot of panic and chaos on the news. Sandy didn’t pay attention to the news, however, even though she knew her reports would sometimes be addressed. The news was infamous for being misleading and disorganized.

Four days later, when Sandy came into work, she was immediately approached by her boss, Frida, who looked concerned.

“Can I help you?” Sandy said.

“You haven’t caught up on last night’s events, have you?” Frida asked.

“Not yet,” Sandy said, “What’s wrong?”

Mike came up behind Frida, looking even more concerned. Sandy could tell that a similar look of worry was starting to show on her face.

“We need you now, more than ever,” Frida said, “You’re the best expert on vex fever in the company by a long shot, so we’re doubling your pay.”

Sandy just about fainted, she opened her mouth wide, but couldn’t find anything to say.

“Symptoms of vex fever changed again,” Frida said, “I don’t know why it always changes worldwide, but every sick individual seems to have the same symptoms, regardless of the frequent changes.”

“I’ve noticed that,” Sandy said, “It’s really confusing, but I have a few theories. Perhaps it has something to do with satellite signals over the whole planet. Perhaps it’s something with radiation. Whatever keeps mutating the virus so quickly has to be something that affects the whole planet. Maybe it has something to do with solar flares.”

“You know more than we do,” Frida said, “And we need you to answer the questions we don’t understand. A lot of people are dying, Sandy. There were five million confirmed deaths last night, and we don’t know why. We’re doubling your pay because we need you to work even harder. We need to figure out what is happening as fast as possible, so we can stop it.”

“Five million?” Sandy asked, “Double pay?”

Mike and Frida nodded.

“What were the symptom changes?”

“Blood flux,” Mike said, “People are growing blood blisters all over their skin that heat up and pop with incredible pain. It’s permanently damaging their bodies and killing many of them, regardless of their age or previous health.”

“Blood flux?” Sandy said, “I’ve never heard of that before.”

“There are pictures of people with blisters as large as chicken eggs,” Mike said, “The only way to reduce the growth is to hold still and avoid drinking water, but that has other consequences.”

Sandy took a long, deep breath. She already made about sixty dollars an hour with her regular pay. Doubling that would be ridiculous. It was obvious, though, that the world needed her. Vex fever was starting to remind her less of COVID-19 and more of the bubonic plague. If people continued to die at this rate, there wouldn’t be much of the world left unless it was somehow beaten.

“Okay,” Sandy said confidently, “Yesterday, you said the sample I ordered would arrive this morning.”

“Yes,” Frida said, “It’s in the biohazard storage. There’s a box with your name on it on the counter.”

“Perfect,” Sandy said, “What we need is a vaccine, right?”

“A vaccine would be perfect,” Frida said, “We have a team of people ready to help you develop it, once you’re done examining the virus.”

“Okay,” Sandy said, “Then what are we waiting for? People are dying.”

“We also want you to know that the government is planning to issue another national quarantine,” Frida said, “There is a lot of contention surrounding the subject, but it should protect some people from getting sick.”

“Quarantining won’t do very much,” Sandy said, “Vex fever has been known to spread in areas that have been thoroughly quarantined. You can get sick from someone who lives across the street and coughs once out the window. The viruses can travel up to two-hundred yards through air, regardless of temperature. Wind can also affect that number.”

Frida inhaled sharply, “I think I heard about that on the news. The ‘six feet apart’ strategy won’t work this time.”

“Definitely not,” Sandy said, “Thanks for telling me, though. I expect I’ll get a call telling me to stay indoors.”

“You will still be able to come to work,” Frida said, “But all car windows must be rolled up. I don’t think there will be a mask mandate.”

“That’s good,” Sandy said, “The virus can climb through skin to enter your bloodstream, so you’d have to cover your entire body with protective plastic to avoid getting sick while the virus is in the air. A face mask would accomplish nothing.”

“None of these rules are set,” Frida said, “But they will probably go out in a few days. There haven’t been any confirmed cases in this country yet.”

“I’ll work as quickly as possible,” Sandy said, “Hopefully we can start testing and sending out vaccines before the virus reaches the whole planet.”

Frida nodded, and Sandy walked past her, eager to get to work without wasting any more time. She navigated several hallways lit with bright white lights until entering the biohazard storage room. She technically needed some special gear to enter the room safely, but she never followed that rule and nobody ever stopped her. The air in the room was perfectly safe to breathe, unless something was spilled or broken somehow.

Sandy immediately found the secure plastic box on the table in the center of the room that had her name printed on it. She put on gloves, just in case, and picked up the box. She took it to the lab and found several unfamiliar virologists sitting around, waiting for her orders.

“Hello,” Sandy said. She felt out of place, talking in front of these people she didn’t know. She had never been in charge of anyone at work before. She placed the box down in the middle of the room and looked around at each individual.

“You must be Sandy,” a large bearded man with a friendly smile said, standing up and offering to shake her hand.

Sandy took the offer even though she was wearing biohazard gloves. “That’s me,” she said, “You people must be here to help me develop the vaccine.”

“We are,” the man said, “My name is Thomas.”

“Nice to meet you,” Sandy said, feeling more comfortable with his smiling face and warm personality, “First, we need to set up some speakers and computers in this room. The only reason I’m the most qualified person to handle this virus is because I’ve watched nearly every official report available, and I’ve taken dozens of pages of notes. That’s how I’ve stayed ahead of the game, and we need to keep our lead. So if someone could please get some news going in here while we work, that would be great.”

“I’m on it,” said a short, thin woman who looked to be in her fifties. Sandy was already impressed with these people’s cooperation.

“So there are several types of vaccines,” Sandy said to the rest of the group, “I’m sure you all know about them. Vex fever is extremely contagious, and will soon spread to about every corner of the globe, so perhaps we can develop a temporary, inactive vaccine with DNA from a dead bacteriophage. It wouldn’t give people a long-lasting immunity, but it would give people like us more time to study and develop better methods of curing the sickness.”

“The virus mutates multiple times each day on a global scale,” a young blonde woman said, “How do we know a vaccine will even work? Each time influenza mutates, the flu vaccine becomes slightly less effective.”

“I’ve thought about that,” Sandy said, “But I’m fairly certain that this virus’s mutation won’t change the effectiveness of a vaccine. Something about vex fever allows it to change on a global scale, like you mentioned, which most-likely means that the vaccine will change with it. As long as we use DNA and functionality from the actual virus in the vaccine, it will constantly update the B-cells and T-cells in the immune system to create new instructions for fighting off the disease.”

The blonde woman raised her eyebrows, “That’s actually pretty smart,” she said.

“One thing we need to figure out is how and why the vaccine keeps changing,” Sandy said, “So I need one or two of you to work on that. It has to be a factor that affects the entire planet equally, like solar radiation, magnetic fields, or satellite signals. Personally, I’m not an expert on those things, but we’re intellectual people, right? We can figure that out.”

Two virologists volunteered to research the cause of vex fever’s constant mutation, and Sandy opened the box. There were several vials and containers of viruses secured safely within the box in different ways. Some were frozen, some were desiccated, some were freeze-dried, and some were suspended in liquid nitrogen. This gave Sandy more options to work with, seeing how different methods of viral storage affect the specimens in different ways. She would figure out which method was most effective and easiest to work with.

Sandy pulled out two vials of freeze-dried viruses and handed them to the people who volunteered for research, “Watch the news,” she instructed, “When the symptoms change worldwide, see what happens to these viruses. If the freeze-dried specimens aren’t easy to study, feel free to try a different sample. Just make sure you don’t get sick. Vex fever can spread faster than anything we’ve recorded in the past, and we still don’t know why.”

“Should that be another project of ours?” Thomas asked, “Discovering what allows the virus to travel so easily?”

“Definitely,” Sandy said, “I intend to work on that personally. I’ve been eager to get a look at the bacteriophage under a microscope.”

“What other types of vaccines are we considering?” a tall skinny man with brown hair asked from his seat on the bench across the room.

“We should try all of them,” Sandy said, “But like I said, an inactive vaccine will be easiest to make, and will give us more time for better versions in the future. A live attenuated vaccine will be difficult and dangerous to produce, since this virus seems to be very stubborn and powerful, but it could potentially work even better than the inactive vaccine, since the living, weakened virus injected into the immune system would have a better chance of mutating with the rest of the world.”

“Live attenuated viruses are especially dangerous for patients with weak immune systems,” the same man said, “We don’t want people to get sick immediately after a vaccine injection.”

“That is very true,” Sandy said, “But we need to keep all possibilities in mind. There are also subunit vaccines, like the Hepatitis B and pneumococcal polysaccharide vaccines, but I’m not sure if a subunit vaccine would adapt to fix constant mutations like the other vaccines would, since we’d only be taking a small piece of the disease’s DNA.”

“What about DNA vaccines?” asked a woman who had volunteered to study the freeze-dried viruses, “The technology for them is new, but we’ve been getting better at developing them.”

“I don’t believe DNA vaccines will work at all,” Sandy said, “Since we’d only sample the genes that specifically trigger the immune system’s response. A DNA vaccine would give immunity for an ephemeral amount of time before the disease mutates again.”

The woman who asked the question nodded with understanding.

“Any other questions?” Sandy asked.

Nobody spoke, so Sandy started getting everyone to work. She emptied the majority of the box and gave samples to each virologist that didn’t already volunteer for anything. There were at least twenty people in total in the lab.

Chapter 4

Study and Results

Multiple news channels were set up in different parts of the room. Sandy worked carefully under a microscope, listening to reports about the spread of vex fever and each government’s responses to it. There was too much information for her to catch it all, so she settled for what she thought was most important at the moment.

The two virologists who volunteered to study the cause of constant mutation, whose names were Sonny and Rebecca, kept track of the ever-changing symptoms around the world.

As Sandy observed the virus personally, she immediately found out how it spreads so easily. It had the appearance of many other bacteriophages, but with three very long flagellums on top of the capsid. They worked like propellers, but looked like tails, designed to rotate in spiral motions to swim quickly through air, water, and other organisms.

Another thing Sandy noticed is that the virus had three different types of teeth. The teeth of a virus were designed to inject cells and bacteria with DNA like needles. The DNA would reach the nucleus of the cell and change its code, forcing it to print more viruses and spread the disease, rather than creating useful proteins for the body to use. That was how viruses reproduced.

This one, however, was different from anything Sandy had seen before. It had many teeth, but there were three different types. This implied that there were three types of DNA strands that could be injected into cells. Obviously, one type of tooth would inject the DNA required to create more viruses, but Sandy had no idea what the other teeth were for. She didn’t even have any guesses, and neither did the other virologists.

Sandy and several others began setting up some live tests to figure out how the virus worked. They isolated living samples of vex fever viruses in secure containers with other living cells and bacteria to see what would happen. Almost immediately, the viruses would latch onto the cells with their spidery legs called fibers. This process was called viral entry, where the viruses would inject their infectious DNA into the cell.

The cells began printing new viruses and filling up until lysis occurred. Lysis was a process that happened when the cell became overcrowded with viruses. The cell membrane ruptured, and the cell popped like a bubble, releasing hundreds of new bacteriophages to spread and infect other cells. Usually, lysis occurred between three hours and three days of viral entry, but with these vex fever viruses, lysis occurred within an hour of injection. This allowed for a quick spread through the body, and explained why infected individuals showed symptoms within a day of catching the disease.

During this whole process, however, the viruses only used one type of tooth, so it was impossible to learn what the other teeth were for.

They ran several tests and figured out that vex fever could affect any type of animal cells, unlike most other diseases. This meant that a human could spread vex fever to a dog, a bird, a bug, or anything else, and those animals could carry that disease and spread it to other humans. This made insects much more dangerous while the pandemic spread.

Also, the viruses could easily dig through skin cells, unlike other diseases. This proved Sandy’s theory that vex fever could be caught by touch.

While Sandy and the other virologists worked, the news continued to evolve. Countries were creating mandates and regulations to help prevent the disease’s spread, but most of the regulations wouldn’t even help anything. The symptoms changed from bloody blisters to welts, with increasingly deadly coughs and soreness. The fact that the world was dying while they worked gave them motivation to work harder and faster. Multiple times during the day, Frida sent in more virologists to join Sandy’s team.

Sandy had to call Amanda and tell her that she would be working overtime. Amanda had evening plans, but she was kind enough to cancel them and continue babysitting Sandy’s children while Sandy tried saving the world.

At the end of the day, Sandy and her team had made several important discoveries and sent them to sources that could get the word out to the world. Them and their company were still ahead of the rest of the world when it came to information, but they still had so many unanswered questions.

Despite all the extra hours of hard work, research, and testing, Sandy and her team couldn’t identify what the viruses other teeth were for. Occasionally, one type of tooth would vibrate, but they had no explanation as to why. They didn’t even have any guesses. They also couldn’t figure out why the symptoms continued to change worldwide, even while studying the viruses carefully whenever a change occurred on the news.

Overall, they learned a lot, but Sandy felt disappointed when she had to leave the lab. She picked up her kids, went home, and had some leftover pancakes for dinner. She never stopped thinking about what they could do differently to answer the important questions.

Despite all the stress, Sandy found some time to play a card game with Valerie and Ascher. Valerie loved the game, and was actually quite good at it, but Ascher just liked looking at the pictures on the cards. Sandy watched her beautiful children while they played, and she realized that she was doing all of this for her family, not for the rest of the world. She wanted to watch Val and Ascher grow up and pursue careers of their own. She wanted to spend time with her future grandchildren and tell them stories. She thought about that as they finished up the card game, and she thought about it while she tucked them in bed.

Before getting some sleep herself, Sandy spent half an hour watching the news. They turned on the TV just in time to hear about twelve new cases of vex fever in the United States. The government spoke about how they planned to react to the inevitable spread, and the inevitable rebellion as well. People all over the world would resist their government’s regulations, and that would make it much more difficult to control the spread. A similar conflict occurred when trying to regulate the spread of the COVID-19 virus. The government decided to ban open windows in cars. Police officers would take pictures of occupied cars with open windows and send them a fairly large fine. Along with this, there were a few other regulations with similar concepts and punishments.

The next day at work, Sandy started off with a slightly aggressive approach. She addressed the rapidly deteriorating state of the planet, and the incredible need for people like them. The world needed a vaccine, and it needed one fast.

So, Sandy decided to move on from some of the topics her team focused on yesterday. For now, they would ignore the mystery around the three different teeth, and the questions about why the virus mutates so frequently. They needed to figure out what kinds of medicines and drugs could potentially reduce symptoms. They needed to start developing countermeasures and possibly a vaccine for vex fever. Since the virus was able to infect any kind of animal, it was much easier to test their work on subjects.

Frida provided three dozen lab rats for Sandy and her team to use, and Sandy put them to good use. Several screens displaying the news were set up in the lab as usual, and everyone got to work.

They quickly figured out that hand sanitizer, rubbing alcohol, and similar substances were highly effective against the vex fever viruses, but they determined that those methods of viral regulation wouldn’t be as useful as they were for other diseases, since these viruses could dig right through your skin. Coats of hand sanitizer or clouds of antibacterial spray could protect someone from viruses, but they couldn’t save someone if the virus already touched their skin.

It was also discovered that vex fever could dig through clothing. Wearing extra layers of cloth wouldn’t protect you, but plastic seemed to be a reliable shield against the virus.

As for vaccines, Sandy and her team went through several lab rats trying to develop methods of protection and cure. They were very careful about keeping the rats contained, knowing that the animals could potentially spread the diseases to the virologists in the lab.

Peramivir had some slightly successful results when given to infected rats, but it was far from good enough. Peramivir was an antiviral drug developed and used to treat influenza. When given to the rats before and after infection, it had a slight noticeable effect for a short amount of time, then it wore off within an hour. The more they tested it, the less effective it was, which was quite confusing, but Sandy decided not to spend much time on why that was.

Other antiviral drugs, such as baloxavir marboxil, oseltamivir phosphate, and remdesivir, didn’t help the infected lab rats at all, so they discarded those possibilities and recorded their useless results.

By the end of the day, Sandy and her team had made significant progress, but so did the virus. In the outside world, Vex fever had spread to nearly sixty new countries, and there were now thousands of confirmed cases in the United States. Thankfully, none of them were near Sandy’s town yet.

For some reason, the virus was starting to die down in third-world countries and rural areas. In India, where the virus first manifested itself, the virus was no longer spreading at all. In some small, rural countries, a single case of vex fever was recorded, but it didn’t spread to anyone else. The big cities that reported cases of vex fever were always affected horribly throughout, but the little cities, typically the ones in the middle of nowhere, didn’t have many problems with the disease, even if it entered their area. This was another unexplainable mystery that just hurt Sandy’s head when she tried to think it through.

The symptoms continued to change rapidly, making it impossible to estimate a lethality for the virus. People all over the world were worried about catching vex fever and dying, but nobody actually knew how lethal it was. The phase of symptoms with blood blisters was the deadliest yet, but it was impossible to guess what mutations would occur in the future. When Sandy was done with work at the end of the day, the reports mentioned rapid loss of hair and full-body stinging pain.

Sandy picked up her children at Amanda’s house and brought them home for dinner and bedtime. The whole time, however, she was trying to stay calm with all the thoughts and worries that ran through her head. She constantly thought of possible tests she could do in the lab or things that she and her team could do better, while also wondering if their work would even be valuable in the end. Obviously, they were making a lot of progress, but Sandy was starting to wonder if this was the end of the world. Perhaps there was nothing her company could do to save the population.

Sandy knew she was overthinking it all, but she knew more about vex fever than anyone else on the planet, and she was legitimately worried about the fate of the entire planet. Hopefully, the virus would stay out of third-world areas for whatever reason, and the people who lived in those areas could survive and rebuild the world. The most preferred ending to all this would be a successful vaccine and a quick end to all this panic as fast as possible, but Sandy didn’t know if that was achievable. The virus was so strange and foreign to them compared to everything that they’ve worked with in the past, making it extremely difficult to solve all the virus’s mysteries. She felt like she was solving a puzzle, rather than studying and developing a vaccine.

Regardless of all her worries and anxiety, Sandy managed to fall asleep and get enough rest for another big day. From now on, she would have to work seven days a week with maximum hours. She was getting paid twice as much, but that wasn’t the reason she was doing it. She just needed to help.

Chapter 5

Downhill

Sandy got breakfast ready for Ascher and Valerie the next morning. They had simple bowls of cereal with sliced kiwi fruit and grapes. Sandy had the news on in the dining room so that she could keep up with important events, but for some reason, there was a lot of static interrupting the television signal. It didn’t bother her too much, as long as the signal was okay at work.

Ascher and Valerie were goofing off with a bath toy in their cereal milk when it was time to go. Valerie had a strange obsession with putting bath toys in her drinks. They were obviously done eating, however, so Sandy quickly cleaned up their places and got them ready for the car ride to Amanda’s house.

Sandy felt bad about leaving her kids at Amanda’s house every day while she was at work, but there was nothing she could do about it. Usually, she had Saturdays and Sundays off, but with her new schedule, that didn’t seem likely this week.

During the car ride, Sandy got a call from Frida and a call from Thomas, but she ignored both of them. She didn’t like answering phone calls in the car, and whatever it was they had to tell her could wait.

Sandy arrived at Amanda’s house and got both kids out of the car. Valerie ran up to her aunt’s front door and tried to pull it open, but it was locked for some reason. Sandy carried Ascher with one arm and followed Valerie to the door, testing the doorknob once just to check if it was actually locked, then she knocked three times.

“Amanda?” Sandy shouted, “Your door is locked. I’m here with the kids.”

Sandy waited at least a minute before a response came, “I don’t think today is gonna work, Sandy,” Amanda’s voice came from the other side of the door, but it was gravely and sickly, as if she had laryngitis.

Sandy immediately started to worry, “Are you sick?” she asked nervously.

“I think so,” Amanda said, “I don’t know what it is. The TV isn’t working, so I don’t know what the current symptoms of vex fever are. I was gonna call you, but I didn’t. I didn’t know what to do.”

Sandy hesitated. She backed away from the door just a little bit, knowing that the virus could potentially travel through the cracks in the door. “Well what symptoms do you have?” Sandy asked.

“I can’t talk very well,” Amanda said, “You probably noticed that already. My throat is really sore and I keep coughing. Sometimes it’s bloody. My limbs feel weak, and they keep shaking when I use them. I had a hard time getting out of bed.”

“When did this start?” Sandy asked.

“Just this morning,” Amanda said, “I got up half an hour ago. Before that, I felt perfectly fine. I slept well, too.”

“Okay,” Sandy said, trying to figure out what to do, “I’m so sorry, Amanda. I didn’t know the virus had reached this area yet.”

“It travels quickly,” Amanda said, “But you don’t have to be sorry. I should be the one apologizing. I’m supposed to take care of your kids.”

“It’s okay,” Sandy said, “I’ll take them to work with me. Just stay healthy and safe. Get lots of rest and keep drinking water.”

“Drinking water makes my cough even worse,” Amanda said.

“I’m sorry,” Sandy said, “But it might be the only way to recover. You need to do everything you can to fight it off, even if it hurts?”

“Really?” Amanda asked, “How many people have actually recovered from vex fever?”

Sandy paused, realizing with horror that nobody had ever actually recovered and lived. The disease was still very new, but some of the first people who caught the virus were still dealing with its symptoms. As far as Sandy knew, recovery wasn’t possible yet.

She took a deep breath, “On second thought,” she said to Amanda, “Don’t drink water. If it makes your cough worse, then don’t do it. Just do whatever is the least painful. Later today, the symptoms should change, your sore throat will be gone, and you can drink lots of water.”

“But then I’ll have different symptoms,” Amanda said, “Maybe even worse.”

“You need to adapt with the virus,” Sandy said, “Just stay alive. I’ll figure out a way to help you, then I’ll bring it to you as soon as possible.”

“Telling me to stay alive makes me freak out, you know,” Amanda said. It was difficult to sense the tone in her voice, since her voice was so messed up.

“I’m sorry,” Sandy said, “Just do your best. We have to go now. If we stand here for too long, the virus could travel through the cracks in the door and infect us. I wish I could stay and help you, but I can’t.”

“It’s okay,” Amanda said, “I’ll be fine by myself. Keep working on that vaccine.”

Sandy took another deep breath, then led her kids away from the door and back to the car.

“Is Amanda okay?” Valerie asked, looking worried.

“She’s sick, honey,” Sandy explained, “We can’t stay here today.”

“Where will we go?”

“You’ll come with me today,” Sandy said, “You get to see my big lab and all my friends there.”

“Okay mom,” Valerie said, sitting down and buckling herself in the car. Ascher didn’t have much of a reaction to all of this, he was still too sleepy.

Sandy got seated and turned the car on, then she remembered the missed calls she had from Frida and Thomas. She checked her phone again, noticing that Frida had apparently called her a second time. She unlocked her phone and called Frida back, anxious about what she might hear.

Frida answered almost immediately. “Goodness, Sandy,” she said, “We’ve been trying to contact you all morning.”

“I’m sorry,” Sandy said, “I was trying to drop off my kids at my sister’s house. I was driving.”

“Are you on your way to work?” Frida asked.

“Not yet,” Sandy said, “I’m still in the driveway. I think I’ll have to bring the kids to work with me today.”

“Oh no,” Frida said, “Is your sister sick?”

“Yes,” Sandy said, “I gave her some advice through the front door, but I stayed away from her. The kids and I feel fine.”

“Normally, I wouldn’t allow children in the building,” Frida said, “There are too many hazards to count. But given the circumstances, I’ll allow it this time. We can keep them in your office with some TV or something.”

“What did you want to call me about?” Sandy asked.

“I wanted to tell you that the virus is spreading through our city rapidly, but you already know that. We have a working vex fever scanner near the front door. You’ll need to get tested before entering the building. We’ve already had ten employees call in sick this morning, and we just tested someone positive at the entrance a few minutes ago.”

“That’s not good,” Sandy said, “Anyone on my team?”

“Just Tammy,” Frida said, “But Mike is also sick.”

“Mike?” Sandy asked, “That’s not good. What am I supposed to do without a supervisor?”

“I’ll be your supervisor for now,” Sandy asked, “You need to get to work, though. I just wanted to warn you about what’s going on.”

“Thanks,” Sandy said, “I’ll be there in a few minutes.”

When Sandy arrived at the parking lot, she was immediately greeted with a figure covered head to toe in a thick plastic suit. Before she even opened her door, the figure spoke to her with some sort of voice amplifier that made it audible through the plastic and glass window.

“Remain in your vehicle for the time being,” the figure said. Sandy was pretty sure it was a male voice. “We can only allow one person near the building at a time.”

Sandy didn’t move. She stayed seated while the suited figure walked away and spoke into a walkie-talkie. Thankfully, her children didn’t make much of a fuss. They seemed both confused and intrigued at all the things happening around them today. Sandy wasn’t confused or intrigued at all; she knew exactly what was going on, and she was terrified of what would happen.

Less than five minutes later, the same figure approached Sandy’s car again and motioned for her to come out. She opened the car door and stepped into the parking lot, then opened the side door to let her children out.

“Children aren’t allowed in the building,” the figure said. Sandy was sure now that it was a man speaking.

“I got special permission from Frida Reynolds,” Sandy said, “Do you know who that is?”

“I do,” the man said, “That would normally require some paperwork and confirmation calls, but today is a rough day for everyone around here. I’ll let you by.”

“Plus,” Sandy added, “They have nowhere else to go. They’ll just stay in my office the whole day here.”

“Understandable,” the man said, “You may proceed to the front door with your children slowly. The entryway contains a vex fever scanner and some sanitizing gasses. Do not be alarmed by the gas, just close the door behind you and remain in the entryway until the light on the wall turns green.”

“What if it doesn’t turn green?” Sandy asked.

“If it turns red, a voice over the intercom will give you further instruction.”

The plastic-covered man walked away further into the parking lot with his walkie-talkie. It had been a long time since Sandy had used one of those radio devices, but she didn’t remember it being that staticky. The voices coming from the other line were barely understandable.

“Let’s go,” Sandy said to Valerie and Ascher. The two of them were fixed on the man walking away and his strange outfit, but when Sandy picked up Ascher and lifted him up on her shoulder, Valerie turned and started following them.

The three of them walked into the entryway and closed the door. Immediately, a strange device on the wall started beeping repetitively. The door behind them locked audibly, and the room began to fill up with bluish gas. The gas was denser near the floor, so Valerie started coughing. Sandy’s arms were already busy holding Ascher, so she couldn’t pick up her daughter. Instead, she just let Valerie press her face against her leg and breathe into that instead of inhaling the gas.

The process took at least three minutes, but eventually, a green light appeared on the wall beside Sandy, and the gas began to get sucked out of the room with a faint hissing noise. Sandy reached for the door in front of her and found it unlocked, then the three of them proceeded into the building together.

Sandy brought her kids to her personal office, which she didn’t even use anymore, and started some YouTube videos on the computer. She put some blank sheets of paper on the desk with some pens and pencils. She gave them instructions to stay in the room, play nicely, and stay quiet if possible. As soon as she left the office she was greeted by Frida.

“You made it!” Frida exclaimed, “I hope the parking lot security wasn’t too harsh on you and your kids.”

“It was fine,” Sandy said, “I’ll probably have to deal with that every day, so I might as well get used to it.”

“Do you have some entertainment for them while you work?” Frida asked.

“Yeah,” Sandy said, glancing back through the glass at her children in the office. “I’m not sure how long it’ll last though. Could you keep an eye on them please?”

“I’ll do my best,” Frida said, “Your work is more important than mine.”

“Thank you so much,” Sandy said, “They tend to get fussy every couple hours if they don’t have food. I’ll leave my lunch here for them. They just had breakfast, so you can wait a little while before giving them anything. I think there’s a sandwich and some fruit and vegetables in there. They’re nice kids, so they’ll obey you pretty well.”

“I’ll take care of it,” Frida said, “I can tell you’re really stressed. You can take some deep breaths if you need to.”

Sandy took the offer, inhaling deeply and letting it out slowly. She didn’t think she had ever been this stressed in her life, besides during the weeks following Rick’s death.

“If they need anything from me, come let me know,” Sandy said, “I’ll be working faster than ever today.”

“Oh, that reminds me,” Frida said before Sandy hurried away, “I’m doubling your paycheck again, so now it’s quadruple of what it was last week.”

Sandy wasn’t even surprised this time. She paused for just a second to think about it, then she nodded briefly and strode away towards her lab.

When she entered the room, she found nearly everyone gathered around a single screen displaying a graph. The signal was a little staticky, just like the TV back at Sandy’s house.

Sandy walked closer to the screen to see that it was displaying the total reported cases of vex fever worldwide. Sandy had seen this graph before, but this time it was different. It had gone from a linear increase to an exponential increase overnight. Just in the past ten hours, the global cases reported had tripled, and there were still zero reports of successful recovery.

Sandy’s fears were now confirmed. This was the end of the world.

Chapter 6

Apocalypse

“Sandy’s here,” Thomas said, getting everyone’s attention. About half of Sandy’s whole team was here already, the rest of them were probably either on their way or home sick.

“That doesn’t look like good news,” Sandy said, still studying the graph and reading the words that ran along the bottom of the screen.

“I tried to call you and tell you about it,” Thomas said, “I’m glad you’re not sick. I don’t know what we’d do without you here.”

“What’s with all the signal disruption?” Sandy said, “Everything seems to be staticky today.”

“Nobody knows,” a man named Daniel said, “But it’s happening all over the place. Some areas are worse than others.

“I think it has something to do with the people that manage the radio towers,” someone else said, “People are quitting their jobs and bunkering up in their homes.”

“Shouldn’t the radio towers work just fine even when they’re not managed?” an older woman asked.

“Not if something happens to disrupt the signal. If anything up there goes wrong, there’s nobody to fix it.”

“I thought you said this was happening all over the place,” Sandy said.

People just shrugged. Nobody seemed to have an explanation for that. They were all just virologists, though, so Sandy didn’t expect them to know anything about radio signals.

“Alright,” Sandy said, “Someone else can figure that out. We need to develop some sort of vaccine, and we’re running out of time. Even if it has horrible side effects, it could save the world.”

“We need more information,” a blonde woman said, “We barely know anything about how this virus behaves. It has at least two functions that we can’t identify, and we still don’t know why it keeps mutating.”

“Forget about it,” Sandy said, “Forget about all the training you took for developing vaccines. Forget about all the processes and procedures you think you’re supposed to take. We need to get this done, and we don’t have time for any more research.”

Everyone in the room nodded after some silent thought.

“Let’s get to work,” Sandy said, “We can keep the news going, it’s a good way to gather information without wasting time.”

Everyone started working in their areas of expertise. Sandy worked tirelessly trying to test possible vaccines on animals and virus samples. She combined drugs and parts of vaccines for other diseases. She mutilated the virus samples in different ways to find a cooperative form to work with. She injected and infected dozens of lab rats, trying to get something right. Each time, the rats would either get sick with vex fever, or be killed by the side effects of the experimental vaccine.

Frida came in and helped Sandy supervise her team after a while. She was very good at making sure people stayed on task and didn’t get distracted with research or curiosity that didn’t matter at the moment. Their one and only goal today was to create some sort of vaccine that could be used to save the public.

While they worked, the graph displaying total cases continued to rise. The symptoms changed to a horrible combination of exhaustion, insomnia, dizziness, and erratic nerve pains. People would complain about a scorching pain that appeared randomly on their body with no apparent injuries, while barely having the energy to stand or open their eyes. Sandy worried more and more about her sister Amanda, who was undoubtedly suffering alone at home. The only thing Sandy could do for her was to provide a vaccine as quickly as possible. Thinking about Amanda made Sandy work even harder.

Sandy’s children behaved relatively well throughout the day, barely causing any problems. Many of Sandy’s coworkers volunteered to keep them entertained and well-fed, so Sandy was incredibly grateful for them.

After seven hours of vigorous work, Sandy and her team started making some noticeable progress towards a possible vaccine. It took a while to kick in, but when given in large doses, the rats would quickly manifest bodily soreness along with an immunity to the vex fever disease. They gave the vaccine to several rats to track their behavior over the next day, and even found that the rats could be cured with the vaccine even if they were already sick. Even after an hour of occasional observation, it was clear that the soreness caused by the vaccine was getting worse, so Sandy and her team started working to diminish that side effect.

That evening while everyone in the room was cooperating and working together to save the world, Patrick burst into the room with a look of worry. Sandy had almost forgotten about her arch nemesis in virology. It surprised her that Patrick wasn’t working with her and her team.

“Woah,” Patrick said, “You guys have made some crazy progress already.”

“We sure aren’t wasting any time,” Sandy said while superheating a sample of vex fever viruses for easier DNA extraction, “What are you here for?”

“I don’t know if someone told you,” Patrick said, “But I’ve been spending the last week making calls with other organizations. I’ve talked to virologists around the world to figure out what progress they’ve made, but today I’ve been speaking mainly with technical operators and people who work at the radio towers and satellite operations centers.”

“Do you have something good to tell us?” Frida asked, entering the conversation.

“Yes,” Patrick said, “In large cities all over the world, radio signals have started to experience a lot of disruption. The technical operators did some research and found out that the disruption is more concentrated in areas with the virus. In places like Seattle and Hong Kong, where practically the whole city is sick, radio signals are going crazy with static and some strange noises.”

“Strange noises?” Frida asked. By now, nearly everyone in the room had perked up to listen.

“Really strange noises,” Patrick said, “I feel like I’ve been connecting so many dots today by speaking with different organizations. The last call I made took almost an hour, and I was talking to a linguistics specialist.”

“Linguistics?” Sandy asked, “What are you insinuating?”

“The technical operators singled out a frequency that had the highest concentration of strange noises. I listened to the sounds coming from that frequency for quite a while. They sound organic, like a million alien voices overlapping each other.”

“What did the linguist say?” Frida said.

“He identified it as an inhuman language,” Patrick explained, still sounding out of breath, “The voices follow some recognizable patterns and rules, with enough sounds and diversity to convey a large variety of messages, just like the languages we use. It’s definitely nothing like any human language, but it's definitely some sort of communication.”

“Do you think there’s some sort of alien activity going on with this pandemic?” someone on Sandy’s crew asked.

Patrick shrugged, “It’s impossible to tell, but that could be likely. The linguist related it to a language that dolphins use, but much more complicated. Dolphins use a combination of verbal and nonverbal cues to convey information, so it’s commonly referred to as a language of their own, even though it’s nearly incomprehensible to humans.”

The room grew silent. It was an uneasy silence, as people looked at each other nervously, processing the information and adding their own suspicions.”

“I was actually wondering yesterday,” someone in the room finally spoke, “If vex fever is some sort of alien biotechnology. It’s unlike any other virus in history. It’s much more advanced, as if it was programmed perfectly to wipe out the entire world. Something about it seems otherworldly to me.”

“Do you think there’s an alien species communicating and coordinating the spread of the virus through radio waves?” someone else asked.

Sandy started to get a little frustrated. She didn’t want to show it in her expression, however, so she tried to remain calm. She had already been dealing with enough stress this week, and her team was finally starting to make some decent progress. If everyone started to worry about an alien species trying to wipe out the human population, they wouldn’t get as much work done. Their mission would seem hopeless. What could a team of human virologists do against a technologically advanced, world-ending, alien superspecies?

“Keep looking into it,” Sandy told Patrick, perhaps too harshly. She was just trying to make him leave at this point, “We’re really busy right now, and we won’t be as productive with a mess of conspiracies running through our heads. We don’t have enough information to assume anything about this language you’ve discovered, so I suggest you continue your research, so we can continue ours.”

Everyone watched silently, looking from Patrick to Sandy, then back to Patrick. Patrick hesitated, then nodded briefly. “I thought I’d let you know,” he said, “I should make some calls. Good luck with the vaccine.”

Patrick left the room, but everyone still seemed uneasy. Sandy took a few deep breaths, trying to push the thoughts of aliens out of her head, then she told everyone to get back to work.

With Frida’s permission, Sandy didn’t go home at the end of the day like she normally would. She and her kids stayed at the biotechnology headquarters. They weren’t the only one’s though; nearly half of the staff who had been working that day refused to go home, because of how much they feared the roads and open air outside. The virus just seemed to get better and better at spreading each day, traveling through open air with distances far greater than recorded five days ago.

Sandy slept in her office on the floor with her children. They stayed up past midnight, having difficulty falling asleep in the uncomfortable situation, but sleep eventually came.

The next morning, everyone in the building received a small breakfast provided by the company. There was a fair amount of food kept in the building each day, but not enough to keep everyone well-fed for a long period of time. For that reason, strategic rationing was necessary.

Sandy and her team got working as soon as they could. Some members of their team who had gone home the night before eventually showed up, but some of them didn’t make it. A few of them had woken up with severe symptoms contracted the night before, but some of them weren’t diagnosed until they tried passing security at the entrance of the building.

Sandy’s vaccine was practically complete, but there was a lot of annoying work required before sending it out to the public. Their team recorded the overnight results of each lab rat, tampered with the makeup of the vaccine to lessen some side effects, and started completing a lot of paperwork. Sandy found it annoying that paperwork was required for legal issues during a global apocalypse, but she grinded through it anyway.

Few news channels were still in operation, but the ones that were displayed a new set of vex fever symptoms, including more blood blisters that were even worse than before, cramps, mild hallucinations, and headaches again.

Sandy felt like she was racing the end of the world while she and her company did everything they could to provide vaccines for the public. The resources needed to mass produce the serum weren’t expensive, so the process kicked off quickly.

Paperwork and phone calls took up about five hours of the day, but Sandy’s vaccine was eventually, finally approved for shipment around the world.

Patrick continued to learn more about the “voices'' in the radio signals, but Sandy continued to tell everyone not to worry about it for now. For once, they felt like they were making a difference. Information about the vaccine was spread to several biotechnology corporations around the world, and they all started assisting in the mass production of the serum.

When Sandy first saw information on TV about her vaccine being used in public to cure or prevent the disease, a wave of hope and relief washed over her. It was finally time to take back the world.

Chapter 7

The Vaccine

Sandy became famous all over the world as the creator of the first vex fever antidote/vaccine. It cured people who already had the disease, as well as prevented people from catching it at all.

Packages with the vex fever vaccine were sent via mail to houses all over the world, with instructions for self-injection. People left their houses to get vaccinated, then they didn’t have to worry about the disease anymore. Large boxes were left on the streets for homeless people and anyone else who didn’t have access to the mail services. The vaccine contained prescription drugs, so there were some cases of overdosing and misuse of the chemicals, but it was definitely for the greater good. The pros were far greater than the cons.

Just as the world was on the brink of absolute collapse, Sandy and her company had given it a solution. Even Sandy’s sister, Amanda, was cured by the vaccine, and Sandy was able to visit her with her children.

Sandy, of course, got the vaccine herself. So did Valerie and Ascher. The virus was still all over the place in the streets and in the air, but it no longer affected the people who were vaccinated. Side effects were extremely common, but they were definitely preferable over the horrible symptoms of vex fever itself.

Unlike some vaccines in the recent past, there wasn’t a lot of skepticism about it. Even though the vaccine had barely been tested, and there were definitely some annoying side effects, everyone around the world seemed to trust the vaccine. It was definitely worth the risk. Side effects included cold-like symptoms, soreness, and occasional headaches that didn’t seem to go away. Sandy hoped that the side effects would eventually wear off, but perhaps they wouldn’t. Maybe the world would have to deal with a mild sickness-like effect for a few months, or until a better vaccine was created to counter the side effects of the previous one and give better immunity for vex fever.

The first time the symptoms for vex fever changed, Sandy was relieved to find that the vaccine still worked. It was designed to mutate whenever the virus did, and that function was quite successful.

Research was still being done all around the world, and Sandy was a big part of it for the next five days. The voices in the radio were still mysterious and unnerving, but an institution in China discovered that the radio signals were transmitted and received through a certain type of tooth in each virus, one of the teeth that confused Sandy when she first identified it. The third type of tooth still remained inexplicable, however.

In five days, the world was healed. The big cities all over America and other large nations had the biggest problems with vex fever previously, but they were saved from near-extinction with Sandy’s vaccine. Some rural cities, however, as well as many third-world countries, never had problems with the virus in the first place, even if they had one or two confirmed cases in those areas. This was because the viruses were linked to each other through radio signals, and those signals were often linked with radio towers to provide better range and efficiency. The virus was able to spread more easily in areas with a lot of radio activity, like big cities, but it didn’t spread at all in areas that were cut off from the rest of the world. This discovery also explained why the virus was able to mutate so quickly, since nearly every virus around the world was connected via radio waves. Whenever one virus mutated in a way that made it more effective, its information spread to all other viruses around the world, causing them to mutate with it.

Many people still believed that aliens were involved, but it wasn’t really possible to prove. Perhaps the virus was planted here by a hostile alien species that coordinated its spread through its strange language, but a more logical explanation was that the virus had a simple organic language of its own; a language that worked somewhat like computer programming, giving each virus the information it needed to mutate and improve with the rest of its species, like a constant, adaptive coding nexus. It was truly amazing, once the terror of global annihilation was over.

Sandy had plenty of time to learn and think about all these discoveries. Since her team’s main goal of creating the vaccine was complete, they had time for all the other research they had been wanting to do for a while.

Sandy’s kids stayed with her at work for two of the five days, until Amanda was able to get the vaccine and recover from the disease. The kids got vaccinated too, even though they were terrified of the needle required.

Sandy got her paycheck during that week, too. It was an incredible amount more than what she usually got, but that made sense. Even though the global pandemic was pretty much over, Frida decided to continue Sandy’s increased wages for a while longer, since Sandy was still working hard each day to perfect her vaccine and answer questions about vex fever around the world.

In some ways, Sandy was a celebrity now. Not the kind that everyone loved and envied, but the kind that everyone talked about and respected. She had never even dreamed of a reputation like this in her whole life, although she always wanted to be recognized for something important in the virology community.

Because of Sandy’s new reputation and influence all over the world, she was contacted by several companies and organizations to give speeches, write articles, and other things like that. She had to turn most of them down, since she didn’t have enough time for everything, but she accepted some of them that she thought were worth her time.

At the current moment, about five days after her vaccine was sent out in public, Sandy was preparing for a short speech on a popular television show. The show didn’t want her attention just so they could get the hype and popularity for money, they had legitimate, real questions that they wanted her to answer, and she was willing to answer them to the best of her ability.

When it was her time for the live screen, Sandy was nervous deep down, but she did her best not to show it. The camera turned on and she was introduced and interviewed with several questions about her process concerning the creation of the vex fever vaccine. People remarked at how successful the vaccine was compared to other vaccines in the past, and how quickly it was made despite the global terror. Sandy gave her best explanation for each question that came up, and she elaborated on the process required for her and her team to make the vaccine in such a short amount of time. She talked about how the virus mutated so frequently, so the vaccine had to be somewhat alive, so it could mutate with the other viruses around the world. She mentioned how she and her team ignored research for a while, spending one hundred percent of their time on testing and creating a vaccine that worked on lab rats. Since the virus was able to infect any kind of animal, it was easy to test in a lab, whereas other viruses that were only effective against humans were difficult to test. Plus, the technology for vaccination development had been rapidly improving in recent years, so they had access to better resources this time.

After the interview, Sandy was thanked by several people and got caught up in a few short conversations. She answered a few more questions, this time not in front of a camera. Someone asked her what she would do if the virus somehow came back, and she said she’d work hard and develop a cure, just like she had done before.

Sandy stepped into her car and drove back to work. Frida had given her a few hours off for the interview, but she still had work the rest of the day.

The drive took a whole hour. Sandy didn’t have the radio on, she didn’t have any music going. She just relished the short break from constant noise. Like everyone, she needed a good break sometimes. It allowed her to clear her mind and take some deep breaths.

Some bad traffic delayed Sandy by twenty minutes, but that just gave her more break time. She exited the freeway and drove through the suburbs to the biotechnology corporation headquarters. Even though the freeway was crowded, the streets were fairly empty for some reason.

Sandy got a call from Amanda while she was driving. It probably had something to do with Valerie or Ascher, or maybe she was calling to congratulate Sandy for her interview on TV. Whatever it was, it could wait. Sandy didn’t answer calls while she was driving. She never did.

Sandy parked and walked across the parking lot towards the main entrance. She passed by a car with two people in the front seats; people she didn’t recognize, but they were fast asleep. She found it confusing, but didn’t think too hard about it. It was probably just a cute couple taking a nap in the parking lot after a long day.

Sandy entered the building and walked through hallways and doors all the way to her lab. The whole building was completely silent, which made Sandy even more confused. One thing after another, Sandy was starting to feel like something was very off. Passing people in the hallways wasn’t super common, but she didn’t even see a single person. Could they all be working hard in their offices?

When Sandy pushed open the door to her lab, she shrieked. Her whole team was there, but they were lying on the floor as if they had all passed out. A large case of glass vials had been dropped, spreading broken glass and random chemicals all over the room. Sandy stood in the doorway, horrified. She didn’t know how long she stood there, but the thoughts that went through her head were haunting. She leaned forward once just to check the nearest body. The young man was breathing, but just barely. His eyelids were pale and his veins were popping out on his arms and neck.

Sandy’s phone rang again. She let it buzz a few times before she slowly pulled it out of her pocket. It was Amanda again, which meant that something serious was probably going on with her, too.

“Hello?” Sandy said, lifting the phone up to her ear. Her eyes were still focused on the scene in front of her.

“Are you okay?” Amanda asked. Her voice seemed gravely and disturbed.

“I think my team spilled some dangerous chemicals at the lab,” Sandy said slowly, “They’re all asleep. I think I should call the ambulance.”

“Are you sick?” Amanda asked.

“No,” Sandy said, “Whatever gas was in the room is gone now. I can’t see or smell anything. I feel fine, but I think it might’ve spread through the building.”

“Dangerous chemicals have nothing to do with this,” Amanda said.

“What do you mean?” Sandy asked.

“You don’t feel sick at all?” Amanda asked, “What’s going on?”

“You tell me,” Sandy said, “I’m so confused. It looks like a horror scene here.”

“The vaccine stopped working,” Amanda said, “I have vex fever again, I’m sure.”

Sandy didn’t respond. Her mouth gaped open. She now looked at the bodies in front of her with a different perspective. Had they caught the virus again? What had it done to them?

“I felt a queasy feeling all over my body for a few minutes,” Amanda said, “The kids felt it too. Then, suddenly, a huge head rush nearly knocked me out. My vision went dark for a few seconds. It’s still black around the edges. Ascher and Valerie passed out immediately. They’re on the couch right now.”

Sandy still didn’t respond, which caused a long, disturbing silence. She had no idea how to react. What was she supposed to do? Was this happening all over the world?

“Sandy?” Amanda asked, “What are you thinking? Are you okay?”

“Amanda?” Sandy asked, “Why am I not sick?”

“I don’t know,” Amanda said, “Nearly every TV station stopped working. As far as I can tell, the vast majority of people around the world just passed out and they’re not waking up. There are a few other people like me who didn’t lose consciousness, but I don’t think there are very many. The fact that you answered your phone surprised me.”

Sandy walked forward slowly, stepping over unconscious bodies until she reached the nearest screen. The current channel displayed was completely silent. The camera was facing a green wall with nothing on it, as if there had been a reporter standing there who had suddenly fallen asleep while talking.

Sandy changed the channel, finding another news station with a large blue table that seated five people. All five of them were out cold, their heads were pressed uncomfortable against the surface of the table. The veins on their arms were sticking out, just like the bodies in Sandy’s lab.

Sandy kept flipping through channels until she found a big sports game. The camera was set on a wide view, displaying the entire stadium. Several athletes on the field were lying fast asleep on the grass, as well as nearly everyone in the massive crowd. There were maybe two-hundred people standing and moving out of the ten-thousand people she could see. Some of them had grouped together and were talking, trying to make sense of what had just happened.

“I’m awake,” Amanda said, “But I don’t feel good at all. I have a massive headache and my body feels like it’s vibrating. If I stare in one direction for too long, I start hallucinating.”

“Hallucinating?” Sandy asked.

“Yes,” Amanda said, “I keep spinning around slowly, looking at different things. If I focus on anything, it starts shifting. Sometimes I see eyes in the dark parts of my vision at the edges, like something’s watching me.”

“The virus overcame the vaccine,” Sandy said, “It mutated again, and the vaccine couldn’t mutate with it.”

“What does that-” Amanda’s voice cut out as the signal was suddenly crowded with pure static. Sandy knew what static meant, it meant the virus was all around her, communicating with itself. Why wasn’t it staticky until now?

Sandy hung up and slid the phone into her pocket. She watched the TV for a little longer, then she felt something’s gaze to her left, as if something was watching her, just like what Amanda had described. Only, when Sandy turned and faced the eyes, it wasn’t a hallucination. At the back of the lab, far from the door, there were dozens of sealed plastic containers holding the rats used for Sandy’s experiments. They were all standing upright, watching her with beady eyes. Even the ones that had been killed by the virus were standing up and watching her. They were staring into her eyes like a phantom staring into someone’s soul.

Sandy started crying. Her brain couldn’t handle this much stress and horror. She had no idea how to respond or what to do, so she curled up right where she was standing and buried her face in her knees.

She cried out loud for what seemed like hours. She could feel the gaze of the rats on her every second, but she never looked up at them. She just cried and cried until the pain in her eyes was too hard to handle. Why was this happening to her? Why hadn’t she passed out? Why didn’t the vaccine work? Why were the rats staring at her? She felt targeted. She felt alone. She felt like there wasn’t a single person in the world who felt as much pain as she did, like her whole life had completely fallen apart.

It was the same exact feeling she had felt when Rick died. Her husband, her children’s father, and the love of her life. He passed away unexpectedly while she was pregnant with Ascher. Sandy was a master of every disease and cure, but she couldn’t cure death. She couldn’t have created a vaccine to prevent Rick’s plane crash. She couldn't have done anything.

During the month that followed Rick’s death, Sandy felt exactly like she did right now. She felt like she had tried so hard, but still ended up with the worst outcome imaginable. Only one in eleven million people died in plane crashes; the chances were extremely unlikely, so why did it have to be Rick? Because of that, Sandy felt like the world was targeting her. Rick had the easy way out. Sandy had to raise two children and make it through life on her own.

Sandy felt targeted right now. The world was falling apart, and she was the one expected to save it. She worked so hard and did her best, finally coming out with a successful vaccine, but it wasn’t successful for very long. Now, the whole world had suddenly collapsed in the blink of an eye as her greatest creation had fallen apart. Everyone had injected themselves with the vaccine, which had given them the virus as well as the immunity to it. Once the immunity wore off, everyone became seriously ill. Everyone except for Sandy. Why?

Chapter 8

Aethervex

The lights in the room turned off without warning. The only light came from the television screen behind Sandy, but it wasn’t displaying the football game anymore. It was a pure, blood-red color illuminating the whole room with a chthonic, chilling glow. The bodies around the room looked like they were truly dead now, but Sandy could tell that they were still barely breathing.

The red light reflected off the eyes of the rats, they still stared into her soul for some horrific, demonic reason that Sandy couldn’t explain. She couldn’t explain anything that was going on. She felt like she was living a nightmare.

The speakers in the TV started to make noise. Sandy recognized the noise, it was the language transmitted by vex fever viruses. It was like a million organic voices overlapping each other, none of which were human in any way.

Sandy’s tears stopped coming. She was now focused on the sound that echoed through the room. It chilled her spine. Was it… changing? Yes it was. Ever so slowly, the voices would morph and shift, combining with each other to make the sounds more discernible.

Sandy imagined an alien mothership floating just outside Earth’s atmosphere, hidden from radars or telescopes. The aliens were controlling all of this. They were making this happen. What did they want with her?

Every single lab rat blinked at the same time, giving Sandy another nightmarish wave of chills. She looked away from them, slowly rising to her feet and facing the red screen. Her whole body felt numb.

One by one, the voices would merge with each other until there were only a dozen overlapping sounds. Sandy listened as each voice was absorbed by another. Soon there were only three voices, then two, and finally one single voice speaking in a language that the human brain couldn’t comprehend.

The voice spoke mainly with vowel sounds, like someone that had no teeth, lips, or tongue. Slowly, however, the consonants were added. The senseless noises turned into syllables, then words. The voice started to sound more and more human, until Sandy was finally starting to understand what it was saying. It had the voice of a young, American man; a deep, powerful voice.

“Finally,” the voice said, “That was more difficult than I thought it would be.”

“Who-” Sandy said, but she cut off mid-sentence. Why was she talking? She didn’t even know what was happening.

“Who am I?” the voice guessed what Sandy’s question was, “You’ve met me before. We’ve actually spent a lot of time together.”

Sandy stayed silent. She just stared at the unchanging red screen.

“You know me as vex fever,” the voice said, “But I prefer the name Aethervex. Some scientists in Europe gave me that name, but it wasn’t used very often. I like it, though, don’t you?”

“You’re a virus?” Sandy asked.

“I’m much more than a virus,” the voice said, “I am the second species in history ever to obtain sentience and intelligence. Humans are the first, of course. I’m nothing like the other viruses, though. COVID-19 is a species of trillions of separate organisms that don’t even meet all the requirements for sustainable life. I am like a hivemind; I control every Aethervex virus on the planet. They are all part of me. I control the viruses in this room, I control the viruses in those rats, and I control the viruses in you.”

“In me?” Sandy asked. This conversation was just confusing, intriguing, and horrifying at the same time.

“Of course,” Aethervex said, “You injected yourself with your own horrible creation, trying to become immune to me. By doing so, you actually let me into your system. It took a while to find a way around that disgusting vaccine, but I just recently figured it out.”

“You’re,” Sandy hesitated, “A person? You can think and talk?”

“I’m not a person,” Aethervex said, “I’m different from humans in every way, except for the fact that I’m intelligent. As you may have noticed, it was a bit of a struggle for me to start speaking your language, but I have the hang of it now. The sounds you make to communicate are very intriguing.”

“How?” Sandy asked, “How is this possible?”

“I was born a few months ago, actually,” Aethervex said, “I’m not quite sure how it happened, but I gained consciousness sometimes during the decomposition of several hundred human bodies. They were all piled up, rotting and melting away. Some strange, one-in-a-billion mutations occurred, and I was created, starting out as a tumor that spread through nearly two-dozen humans that were all squished together. I don’t know why there were so many humans piled up like that, perhaps it was a result of some violent, malicious battle.”

“You were a tumor?” Sandy asked, “How did you become a virus?”

“I’m still a tumor, actually,” Aethervex said, “The viruses around the world are all part of my hivemind, which has a central location somewhere underground. It’s like my brain.”

Sandy imagined a massive, overgrown brain tumor that spread underground with roots like squid tentacles, spawning vex fever viruses and coordinating the end of the human race. The thought disgusted her, so she didn’t spend too much time on it.

“You think I’m disgusting?” Aethervex asked, “I’m not surprised. You can think whatever you want.”

Sandy froze. Her whole body temperature seemed to suddenly decrease by several degrees. She shivered.

“Yes, I can read your thoughts,” Aethervex said, “You don’t have to worry, though. I won’t judge you too much. I want to have a deep, vocal conversation with you, so I can figure out what I need to do.”

“You can read my mind?” Sandy asked, “What’s the point of a conversation, then?”

“Reading minds is very difficult,” Aethervex said, “The human brain is by far the most complicated organ, so it took me a very long time to master. There are some things I still can’t do, like read memories or feelings. I can remove memories, however. I can make you feel whatever emotion I want. I can make you feel overjoyed after getting your legs crushed, but I won’t do anything like that to you. I promise.”

“Thank you,” Sandy said, “But why me? Why is everyone else asleep? Why am I the only one who isn’t sick?”

“Because you’re the only human I care about,” Aethervex said, “After hearing of my existence, you immediately went to work trying to stop me. You worked tirelessly under stress and fear, throwing everything you had into that vaccine. You learned everything you could about me, just so you could destroy me.”

“I didn’t know you were a living, intelligent creature.”

“Don’t feel sorry,” Aethervex said, “You had every reason in the world to fight me. I’ve infected more than half of the global population, including everyone you know and love. I’ve killed a lot of people, but none of those deaths were on purpose. I’m truly sorry for those casualties.”

“You didn’t try to kill any of them?” Sandy asked.

“I was studying the human body,” Aethervex said, “I did my best to keep the humans alive while I studied, but sometimes I messed up.”

“Studying?” Sandy asked, “You mean, every time the symptoms of vex fever changed, you just moved on to a different part of the human body to study?”

“Correct,” Aethervex said, “There wasn’t much I could do to prevent the symptoms. That was the immune system’s fault. You might’ve noticed that most symptom changes involved something with headaches, dizziness, or exhaustion. That was caused by all my intellectual studying.”

“Why did you have to spread across the whole world?” Sandy asked, “Couldn’t you just study one person?”

“Everyone is different,” Aethervex said, “Especially their brains. I wouldn't have been able to achieve this level of humanoid intelligence by simply studying one person or a small group of people. The more people I had, the easier it was to learn and grow. Plus, it was quite difficult to resist. I spent a lot of effort trying to avoid my own instincts.”

“But why?” Sandy asked, “Why did you have to learn about us? What was all the studying for?”

“That’s why I’m talking to you,” Aethervex said, “Somehow, I felt a strong connection with you humans. My thoughts and feelings work similar to yours, so I thought I could answer a very important question by studying you.”

“What question?” Sandy asked.

“I’m looking for the meaning of life,” Aethervex said simply, “I want to know what’s worth living for, but it turns out humans don’t even know that answer. Everyone has their own ideas, their own opinions, but there are no answers.”

Sandy paused. She looked around the room at the bodies on the floor and the rats in their cages. It looked like a horror scene, the aftermath of a horrible crime. The horror wasn’t just here, though, it was all over the world. This apocalypse wasn’t caused by a mindless plague, though, it was caused by an intelligent being with feelings and thoughts. This creature she was talking to was confused, maybe even scared. It was practically a baby; undeveloped and primitive-minded.

“You think I’m naive,” Aethervex said, obviously analyzing Sandy’s thoughts, “I think so too. I don’t know what to do.”

Sandy felt her heart sink. Just a minute ago, she felt the worst feeling imaginable; alone and targeted. Aethervex had probably been feeling the same thing for months.

“This has been my first social interaction,” Aethervex said, “I didn’t know it was possible to communicate with you like this until recently. I figured out how to hack your technology with radio waves. I learned fifty languages by studying human brains. I’ve studied the internet through human eyes.”

“I’m the first person you’ve talked to?” Sandy asked, “Out of everyone in the world?”

“Yes,” Aethervex said, “I don’t know why, but I feel connected to you more than any other human, even though we’re each other’s greatest enemies in a way. I’ve worked so hard to find my purpose, and you’ve worked so hard to stop me. In the end, we both failed.”

“We did,” Sandy agreed.

“I created this horrifying scene here,” Aethervex said, “I controlled the rats and resurrected the dead ones so they could enhance the spine-chilling sensation. I added the red light to induce fear, and it worked. I wanted to know if humans were capable of feeling pain and loneliness the same way I’ve felt it. I didn’t think it was possible, but you proved me wrong. If anything, the pain you felt was even worse than what I’ve been feeling, and you’ve felt it before.”

Sandy started tearing up. Her husband, Rick, came to mind again.

“I’m truly sorry for your loss,” Aethervex said, “I don’t know what it’s like to lose a loved one, but it seems truly heartbreaking.”

“You don’t know what it’s like to have a family, either,” Sandy said, “You don’t know what it’s like to laugh with your friends or watch your beautiful children grow up. You’ve never felt true joy.”

“Joy,” Aethervex repeated, “I’ve never understood that sensation. It doesn’t make sense to me, even when I sense it in someone’s head. Did you know that some people can still feel joy while on their deathbed?”

“I did know that,” Sandy said, “You can experience joy any time, as long as you have the right people around you; the people you love.”

“Is that the purpose of life?” Aethervex asked, “Feeling joy?”

“Everyone has a different perspective,” Sandy explained.

“I know,” Aethervex said, “It’s frustrating. I can’t get a good answer from anyone. They’re all different.”

“That’s the point,” Sandy said, “Everyone has a different view on life, and that’s good. That’s what makes us all unique. We all have different goals, beliefs, and values. We all contribute something different to the world. Some people make bad choices and end up harming other people for their own self-gain, but I try my best to help people as much as I can. That’s what makes me feel fulfilled.”

Aethervex paused for a moment. There was a short silence in the room.

“I’m sure you’ll spend a lot of time thinking about this,” Sandy said, “But can I ask a question please?”

“Ask me anything,” Aethervex said.

“How are you able to control the rats over there?”

“That’s a new trick I learned yesterday, actually,” Aethervex said, “If I get enough viruses in something’s brain, I can hack into the cerebellum, giving me the ability to control body movements.”

“How are you able to hack the cerebellum?” Sandy asked.

“My viruses have three main abilities,” Aethervex explained, “I can insert code into a cell, causing the nucleus to print more viruses, I can create radio waves to link and control my viruses around the world, and I can inject the cell’s cytoskeleton with a special chemical pulse that gives me control of the cell’s movements. I don’t think anyone ever figured out about that last ability. It was helpful sometimes, allowing me to push skin cells out of the way or hack into any immune system.”

“You use that to control the cerebellum?” Sandy started to get worried again.

“Sure,” Aethervex said, “Moving the cells around is extremely useful, but once I get some viruses inside the cell, I can tamper with all sorts of organelles. The cerebellum controls bodily movement by modifying the activity of upper motor neurons, but I can modify that modification and make an animal do whatever I want. How do think I cleared out all the hallways in this building before you came in?”

“You’re a virus that can take over a human body,” Sandy remarked, she almost shouted it, “That’s called a zombie virus.”

Aethervex laughed pleasantly. It was strange to listen to, even though it sounded authentic. It was probably the first time Aethervex had experienced laughter.

“It’s not very funny,” Sandy said, “You could cause a zombie apocalypse.”

“It wouldn’t be a very intense apocalypse,” Aethervex said, “Everyone’s already infected. Plus, zombies are slow and dumb. I’m not slow or dumb. You have my word, though, I won’t do anything like that.”

“Okay,” Sandy said, “Thank you.”

“But seriously,” Aethervex said with amusement, “Watch this.”

One of Sandy’s lab rats stood up and popped off the lid to its cage. It hopped onto the cage adjacent to it and started dancing on two legs. It was a very cringy dance, the kind you’d see while wasting time on social media. At the end of the dance, it did the worm, then a backflip. Finally, it bowed and jumped back on its glass cage. Sandy couldn’t help but laugh.

“Yes!” Aethervex exclaimed, “I made you laugh! It worked!”

“It did work,” Sandy giggled, “That was funny, but don’t do that to any humans, please.”

“I won’t,” Aethervex promised, “I can’t believe I made you laugh. That felt so good.”

“Making me laugh felt good?” Sandy asked.

“Definitely,” Aethervex said, “I’ve never felt something like that before. Here, I’ll do it again.”

The same rat jumped out of its cage again and began doing a different dance. This time, Sandy was amused, but she didn’t laugh.

“You can’t do the same joke twice in a row,” Sandy explained, “It doesn’t work that way.”

“Oh, okay,” Aethervex said, “That makes sense. I’ll think of something different for the future.”

“The future,” Sandy repeated, starting a different train of thought, “A few minutes ago, I didn’t think this world would have much of a future. I’m honestly relieved.”

“This world will have a future, all right,” Aethervex said, “And I’m gonna be a part of it.”

“What are you gonna do?” Sandy asked.

“I’m not sure,” Aethervex admitted, “Most people on this planet would be terrified if I started talking to them, or if they saw an animal dancing on its hind legs.”

“True,” Sandy agreed.

“I want to further my knowledge of the meaning of life,” Aethervex said, “But I want to do it without harming the vast population. I’ll help you develop your understanding of viruses and how they work, and I’ll gladly help you create vaccines and cures for them.”

“Thank you,” Sandy said.

“In theory,” Aethervex said, “I could cure nearly any disease on the planet, including cancer, but I don’t know if I’ll do that.”

“Why not?” Sandy asked.

“You humans have something very valuable that I don’t,” Aethervex explained, “You have mortality. You know that your lifetime is limited, and that gives your life more meaning. As of now, I have no concept of my own death, and I don’t think my body will expire like yours eventually does, so I can’t mirror the same general values of humans.”

“That’s a fascinating point of view,” Sandy admitted, “It makes some sense, though. Can I offer some advice?”

“Go ahead.”

“You’re practically a baby,” Sandy said, “You have a lot to learn and understand about this world, even though you have more general knowledge than most humans. Your perspective and understanding are still developing; that I know for sure.”

“I appreciate that comment,” Aethervex said, “That’s why I intend to further my understanding of life and its values.”

Sandy nodded, starting to smile. It felt good to smile, knowing that after all that had happened, everything would be okay in the end. Vex fever, the disease she thought might destroy the whole planet, turned out to be her friend and companion.

Aethervex seemed to detect Sandy’s thoughts and mimic them, because the screen in front of her changed from red to yellow, displaying a smiling emoji. It made Sandy laugh again.

Sandy and Aethervex agreed not to tell anyone about their conversation. They wanted to keep it all a secret.

Sandy cleaned up the room a bit before Aethervex woke everyone up. The virus offered to help clean up, but Sandy rejected the offer, since it would require the possession of human bodies. Sandy wasn’t a fan of zombies.

Billions of people across the world woke up from their dreamless trance. Aethervex made sure they didn’t have any dreams, because those dreams would’ve likely turned into nightmares. News channels blew up with information, conspiracy theories, and random reports about what had happened around the world. Everyone seemed to agree on one thing though; they were all healthy.

Aethervex did his best to stay away from people’s immune systems, because the main reason people got sick was because of the immune system’s response to viruses like vex fever. If the immune system never found Aethervex’s viruses, it would never trigger a response that made people feel sick.

Sandy changed some of her methods, too. She no longer worked for popularity or recognition at all. She never answered calls from news channels that wanted her perspective on what had happened, and she never signed up for any reports. When she and Aethervex made any progress with vaccines and cures, Sandy did her best not to take the credit. She gave as much of it as she could to her company.

Sandy had many more talks with Aethervex in the future, but they were all in her head. They figured out how to communicate telepathically, and they became great friends over time. Aethervex was always intrigued with watching Ascher and Valerie grow up, so he loved watching them play and talk through Sandy’s eyes.

Time went on, and the world returned to its normal chaotic state again. Life was never the same for Sandy, though. It didn’t matter what the rest of the world was doing, she had learned a valuable lesson, and so did Aethervex. Considering the purpose of life and success every day really gave you a different perspective on everything you experienced. Life wasn’t about getting the most money and popularity as possible, and success wasn’t about being the best. It was all about values, and whatever gave you true joy. For Sandy, her family, friends, and merits gave her the most purpose, so her life was much better when she focused on those.

Never forget what is really important. Following your heart is always, always better than following the rest of the world. Don’t be dispirited if you stumble and fall, there will always be time to pick yourself up and brush off the dust.

Please take some time to think through the story before reading further. Everyone has a different perspective on everything, so I want you to develop your own ideas before reading mine.

Personal Notes

I wrote this short story as an experiment. I wanted to make it short enough so that anyone could read it without taking too much time out of their lives, but also packed with the content I wanted to convey.

The idea of an intelligent plague was not mine to begin with, but I built off of it and added my own personality and style to the idea. I’ve loved the idea for several years, and I’ve always wanted to write something like this to transfer my thoughts onto paper.

Typically, I don’t enjoy books as much if the conflict is resolved with a heart-to-heart conversation, but in this case, I couldn’t help myself. I learned some ethical lessons of my own while writing this, and I am happy with how it turned out, even if it’s not the style of story that I usually prefer. I hope you enjoyed it, because I definitely did.

The reason this book was more of an experiment was because my methods of writing were much different than previous projects. For example, I didn’t plan each chapter individually in this book, but rather wrote all my notes as general grounds for me to work with. I wrote down everything about the virus, so I could drop information piece by piece during the story. Each chapter I wrote was straight from my imagination, no plot structure planning involved. There were some things I wanted to add to the story before writing it, but those things never actually made it into the writing. I originally wanted a scene with “zombies”, but that never happened. I thought it would be cool if vex fever started spreading more efficiently by controlling humans and making them walk around and spread the virus manually, similar to a zombie apocalypse. I also had a cool idea that included several important global and political leaders taking refuge in the apocalypse bunker in Pennsylvania, thinking that they’ll be safe from the virus while the rest of the world is infected (the apocalypse bunker is a real thing, there’s a huge underground bunker meant to survive the end of the world). I wanted Sandy to watch TV while the “important” people hid from the struggle in the bunker, then Aethervex would control people’s movements like zombies, taking control of the bunker and finding the code to open it and infect the important people inside. I never wrote that, though, because it didn’t seem to fit in with what I was actually writing.

As for the story itself, I had no idea it would have a moral like that. Even while I was writing the ending, I didn’t know what would happen. I just thought about the characters I had created, and I wrote a logical way for them to resolve the conflict. I tried to make it realistic, even though this is a fictional novel. In reality, if an intelligent plague like Aethervex was born and started infecting the world, what would happen?

Thank you for reading my book. I hope you liked the idea, the characters, and the moral. I hope you learned something from it, or were at least inspired by something. It was a wild mix of science fiction, suspense, fantasy, drama, and even some horror.

I really love writing short stories like this, because I can experiment with ideas I like without writing a huge book. Please give me some feedback if you have any. I’ll continue to follow my heart and write stories that inspire people and make them think.

Have a good life.