For two sols, Meera wrestled with the encrypted message, her curiosity a silent scream in the back of her mind. But routine was a powerful sedative. Her naturally chatty nature soon overpowered her fear, and she whispered the secret to her colleagues.
Together, they became digital detectives. They scoured the net for any mention of a virus—nothing. Their searches returned sanitized, irrelevant results. They drafted posts, but the platforms auto-deleted them pre-publication, citing 'community standards violations' they couldn't view. Meera's own account was suspended without explanation.
After a few sols, the mystery faded, relegated to the status of irrelevant information. They forgot.
A week later, the memory was dust.
Meera was home, helping her parents cook dinner, when the screaming started. It wasn't a shout of anger, but a raw, primal wail of grief that sliced through the thin walls of their flat.
She and Joe, her colleague from Tekkins, rushed out. Their entire neighborhood was pooling like blood around Shawn's door. Shawn her third colleague—the quiet one, the withdrawn one—was now the center of a storm, collapsed on the floor and wailing uncontrollably as Joe tried to hold her together.
What's happening? Meera's thought was a silent spike of panic.
An automatic ambulance rover screeched to a halt. Robots spilled out, their metallic efficiency a stark contrast to the human chaos. The crowd parted.
Shawn's father emerged, his was cradling his wife's limp body. His proxy robot collected his wife's body from him. Foam crusted her lips. Twin trails of blood leaked from her nose and ears. Her eyes were rolled back, showing only whites.
The robots took the body. The rover sped off.
The crowd drifted to Meera's house, surrounding the sobbing Shawn. Their questions came in a harsh, overlapping wave.
She coughed, choking on her own tears, her words drowned in the wailing.
Meera pushed through, returning with water. Shawn drank, and her words finally broke through. "They… they just came back from a stroll. We were talking and then… she started convulsing. Just fell. The foam… the foam came out of her mouth."
"What sickness does that?" Meera's mother asked, patting her daughter's back.
"Poison," a neighbor declared. Murmurs of agreement rippled through the group.
"Let's not speculate. Wait for the hospital," another voice counseled.
The crowd began to disperse.
Then it happened again.
A teenage boy from Shawn's apartment convulsed. Then two more neighbors. Then Joe's father.
The crowd recoiled, regrouping at a fearful distance. This time, no one moved to help.
"What's happ—?" Meera's mother began, before her own eyes rolled back in a grotesque dance. Her body seized.
Everyone scrambled away from her. Everyone except Joe, Shawn, and Meera.
"Cover your noses!" Desmond, Shawn's father, shouted, already tearing a strip from his shirt and tying it over his face.
The warning came too late. More bodies twisted and fell.
Those who hadn't obeyed soon joined the twitching heap on the ground. But then, some who had covered their noses felt a sharp sting in their eyes. Their world went white, then black, as they collapsed into the growing pile of convulsing forms.
The crowd shattered. People stood isolated, frozen islands of terror, watching their neighbors die.
Children wailed, their parents collapsing before their eyes. Some just stood, paralyzed, shaking as urine darkened their trousers.
Their attention was wrenched to the next street over—a slum barricaded from the rest. Children were beating against the barricade, their small fists pounding, their voices raw.
"Our parents are on the floor! Please, help us!"
"It's a contagious virus," Desmond announced, his doctor's mind finally piecing it together. The children's pleas confirmed it. "It spreads through the eyes! Everyone indoors! Now!"
Meera stood frozen, a statue carved from pure dread, her mind a screaming white noise of panic.
Then she heard the word. Virus.
The word echoed, familiar and terrifying.
A memory, seven sols old, clicked into place with the force of a bullet.
Hope that message isn't related to this, she thought, the blood draining from her face. If it is… we're doomed.
She paused and screamed. "Damn it, damn it, damn it. I am a fool.
The impact of that message had hit like a bolt of thunder; guilt had overridden the fear within her.
"I should have known something like this was going to happen. I shouldn't have sent those messages," she muttered to herself.
"Meera, come in," Desmond shouted from the window of his house.
Meera didn't respond; she stared at the air for minutes.
Then she folded her hands. "I would undo what I and others had done. If nobody can pass information about the virus because of the order we sent, I will make sure I find a way to pass the information myself.
"Mr. Desmond, I know what is happening. Please let everyone gather inside your house," she screamed with all her might.