Page 55 - The Muse 2021

human beings for the rest of eternity. What they didn’t know is that they were too late. Earth was a lost cause with humanity left to die, or so I thought.
The night of November 29, 2061 was when everything changed. I walked out into the living room of Mom and my tiny apartment to see her watching the news as she always did, every Thursday. It was only until I saw her face that I knew something was terribly wrong. It was as if she was frozen in time, unable to take her eyes off the television screen. Her lifeless eyes made my blood run cold. My mother was the strongest person I knew, and to see her like this petrified me. “Mom. Mom! Mom!” I yelled frantically. No matter what I did, I could not seem to get her attention.
At that very moment I heard the news reporter say, “...folks, all I can tell you now is to pray that somehow your life will be spared.”
My head was instantly filled with questions. Right before I had a chance to ask Mom what was going on, the news reporter went completely insane. He was aggressively screaming and breaking everything he saw. He must have gone into some sort of frenzy, and completely lost any sense of self control and sanity he had.
“Water. The water. Don’t...water...drink.” said Mom, her expression unchanging.
I replied, “What are you saying? Don’t drink water? Why not?”
She continued, “No! No! No water! No Water!”
After that, no matter what I did I could not get her to stop screaming. It made my heart skip a beat to see her like
this. She had always been so strong and had never acted like this before...well at least since my father died. I was only ten when colon cancer took his life. I don’t remember much from that day since I was only nine years old, except for my mother’s face. The situation was very similar actually; the same initial reaction and expression on her face. After managing to make her quiet down, I sat down on the couch and changed the channel to a different station. That was the moment I found out that everyone on Earth was probably going to die.
Due to the glacier’s melting, a bacteria, now known as Rednae 425 was released into the ocean, and from there, somehow entered water systems all over the world. Evidently, there were drastic side effects when the bacteria spreads through the body, such as seizures, strokes, and even going completely mad. According to the news channel, fifty percent of the United States population has already been infected with the virus, and because of how contagious the virus is, almost all medical staff had quit.
“Well,” I said to myself, “Looks like I can’t be drinking water anytime soon!”
As soon as I said that, Mom fell to the floor, and started uncontrollably shaking. I tried to help, but I didn’t know how. I just sat there, alone and terrified of what to do, while my mother just lay there, helpless. As I watched the life drain out of her, I felt unbearably empty, as if my heart shattered into millions of pieces that I would never be able to put back together again. I sunk to the floor and didn’t move an inch for the entire night.
After I finally broke out of my state of shock, I assumed I must have gotten the virus from my mother because of how contagious it was, and just had to wait until it took my life as well. Hopelessly, I continued drinking water and eating as usual, waiting and waiting for me to die. Day after day, I watched through the window in my room as life as I knew it disappeared. Nobody went outside anymore; it looked like everyone had suddenly disappeared. The news didn’t come on anymore, so I was left knowing nothing about what was going on. After a week went by, I was running out of food. I didn’t know what to do, considering the fact I had not seen another human being in a week, and on top of that I was only thirteen years old.
That night, I was laying in my bed reading the book my Mom had given to me for my birthday when the doorbell rang. My mind filled with fear. I quietly walked up to the door and looked through the peephole. I saw three people in white hazmat suits. I didn’t know what to do. My first instinct was to hide in my room, so I ran as fast as I could and hid under my bed. Not even a minute later, they broke down the door, and I heard them roughly searching throughout the entire apartment. When one of them came into my room, I didn’t make a sound, once they turned around, I thought I had fooled them. The next thing I knew, two white gloves aggressively pulled me out from under my bed and knocked me unconscious with some sort of sedative.
I woke up in a of hospital room, with a doctor drawing blood from my arm and a countless number of wires attached to me all over my body.
“Wha...What’s going on?”
The doctor replied, “Just lay down and relax, you are safe here.”
Looking back at that day now, that was the biggest lie I ever heard. I have lived at the IOI, or the Institute of the
Immune, for five years now. The IOI is the “safe” place where everyone who is Immune to the Rednae bacteria (Red Plague for short) is forced to live. For all I know, the people in the IOI are the only people left alive. According to Headmistress Mongomery, the woman in charge, the IOI has gathered all human beings in the US left alive, or in other words, people that cannot be infected. Because most of the world’s population has disappeared, I was informed it had stopped climate change from continuing. I still blame the people who were alive centuries ago for everything that has
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