Hyper

[Location: Tuscaloosa Municipal Center, Tuscaloosa, Alabama, U.S.A. Earth Year 2057]

Mr. Anderson drummed his boney fingers on the rubberized top of the old metal desk. “Well what’s it gonna be, Mr. Kennedy? Are you gonna take our offer or are you and your wife gonna go it alone?” He leaned back in his chair and with his elbows on the arm rests, steepling his hands in front of his face.

Charlie sat there silently and pondered the question. It was a no-brainer really. The number he had drawn in the world-wide lottery gave him two choices: he and his wife could stay on Earth and try to deal with the infected on their own, or he could take the job being offered to him as Chief Facilities Operator of a decontamination depot.

He normally made major decisions like this with his wife Linda, but unfortunately she was not a part of the meeting and Mr. Anderson was looking for an answer right now. Charlie was more of a planner and the uncertainty of the situation troubled him. He took a breath and exhaled a long, slow sigh, trying to calm his nerves.

On the wall to his right was a clock that showed 11:45; just before lunch. It was an old analog style clock that at one time had a white face but it had yellowed over time. Charlie thought for a few seconds and couldn’t remember the last time he had seen a mechanical clock. Every part of human life was now run by some form of digital device.

The peeling and dirty pear colored walls along with the musty smell provided evidence that Mr. Anderson’s office in the Tuscaloosa Municipal Center must not have been remodeled for quite some time. Charlie snapped his thoughts back to the question at hand and continued to consider the offer in front of him.

A little more than six years ago, prominent researchers from across the world had been hired by the United Nations with a goal of discovering a vaccine for the disease known as Ebola. Three years later, the Center for Disease Control in the United States verified that the serum called Filoveridae (fill-o-vera-day) would successfully vaccinate humans from the deadly virus.

Since their work had been successful in the laboratory, the United Nations decided to eradicate Ebola from the Earth by inoculating every human being on the planet. Completing this task would have taken years, so they came up with the idea to install a canister of the inoculation serum onto the tail section of large commercial aircraft. As the airliners traveled from city to city and continent to continent, a fine mist of Filoveridae was spread throughout the atmosphere. Rain caused the substance to be leeched into the water supply which was absorbed by every plant on Earth. Humans received a dose of the drug by eating the vegetation, drinking the water, and inhaling the mist that constantly hung in the air around them.

Within a year, one hundred percent of the population had been vaccinated and the horrible disease known as Ebola was eliminated from the Earth. It was a wonderful success until about six months later, when large amounts of people started getting sick. Filoveridae had successfully eradicated Ebola, but it had caused a mutation in the cerebral cortex of close to twenty percent of the humans on the planet.

The medical community named the mutation Vermiculira, which was Latin for The Crimson Wrath. It had been given this name because the blood vessels in the eyes and face of the infected would erupt and turn blood red in color. The worst symptoms by far were extremely irrational behavior and uncontrollable anger. Humans that had experienced the condition violently butchered others as well as themselves as the mutation controlled their contaminated brains. It was if their moral compass had been completely erased. Bottom line: it had caused about one hundred and sixty million people across the entire planet to go stark raving mad.

It was decided the only way to save humanity and propagate the species was to leave the third planet in the solar system and restart civilization someplace else. That someplace else turned out to be Mars. The idea was to relocate all of the humans that had not been affected by the disease to the red planet and leave all of the crazies back on Earth. To ensure that no infected were allowed to reach Mars, a network of decontamination depots had been placed in space, half way between the two planets.

The depots served multiple functions. They acted as a final quarantine facility before a person was allowed onto Mars—a circuit breaker so to speak. The depots were also a space craft refueling station, with a hydrogen fuel condensing facility taking up most of the square footage. The depots also had a large warehouse that was used as a half way point for shipping and package companies to drop their freight.

Mr. Anderson was an official within the Organization of Relocation and was offering Charlie a job that would most likely save his life. He and his wife would be allowed to relocate from the state of Alabama in the U.S.A. to Decontamination Depot t3rm1nu5.

Taking the position would save their lives but would have some consequences. It meant that he and his wife would never feel the gentle breeze of spring on their faces again, or the warmth of the sun through the protective atmosphere of the Earth. They would never feel the effects of real gravity on their bodies, just the simulated variety found on most space stations. The freedom that they once had to travel to the ends of the blue planet would be taken away. In its place would be a life stuck inside of an enormous metal pod in the middle of a dark and dirty hydrogen plant in the vacuum of frigid space.

Mr. Anderson’s tired eyes peered at Charlie over the top of his reading glasses. “Well? What’s it gonna be, son?” He yanked on the knot of his tie to loosen it. “The A.C.’s on the fritz again…” He shook his head and sighed. “I don’t know about this place.”

Charlie scratched his head and nervously exhaled. “I guess the possibility of me getting a few days to discuss this with my wife isn’t an option?”

Mr. Anderson closed his eyes, lowered his head, and sighed. Then he glared at Charlie. “Mr. Kennedy,” he snapped off each word as it left his mouth, “I am offering you the position as a Chief Facility Operator on a decontamination depot. Do you want it or not? If not, it’s no skin off my nose. I’ve got a lot more candidates just like you that would jump at an opportunity like this.”

Charlie knew that staying on Earth was going to be a death sentence for both he and his wife. The only non-infected that would be left behind were the sick, the poor, the homeless, and the criminals. Word inside the prison was that once the last lucky person left Earth, all of the inmates in penitentiaries across the planet would be freed from their cells. This changed their sentence from starvation inside of four concrete walls to fighting the infected to stay alive. It also made the situation on Earth that much more dangerous. Besides the one hundred and sixty million infected crazies running around, there would be close to one million murderers, thieves, rapists, and thugs joining them.

Charlie snapped to attention and shot a glance back to Mr. Anderson. “Okay Mr. Anderson. I—I mean we—accept your offer. How is all of this gonna play out?”

Mr. Anderson smiled and slightly tilted his head to the right, the yellowing fluorescent light slightly reflecting off the age spots on the top of his bald head. “Son, you’ve made the right choice. Earth is goin’ down the shitter and the best bet is to steer clear of the disaster.” He leaned forward and began to tap on his digital-pad. “I’ll take care of all the online forms for you and your wife. What you need to do is go home and break the good news to her.”

Charlie swallowed hard realizing he had just made a decision that would change the rest of his life. “When do we leave? Are we allowed to bring anything with us?”

Mr. Anderson stood from his chair with his wrinkled cotton suit following along. “You’re each allowed to take three cartons of belongings. Clothes, mementos, stuff like that. Everything has to be scrubbed and then sniffed obviously.” Mr. Anderson reached toward Charlie with a friendly smile and a hand shake. “As far as your departure date, you’ll be contacted by v-mail but I would guess it’ll be sometime within the week.”

Charlie, still nervous and a little dazed, stood and shook Mr. Anderson’s hand. “Okay. We’ll be ready. One last question. After serving on the decontamination depot for a while, do you ever see us having a chance to relocate to Mars?” He released Mr. Anderson’s hand and realized that his own hand was slightly trembling. “I know the lottery ticket I drew doesn’t allow us permanent surface privileges, but I thought after a while…if we did a good job...we could start a life there. We could be with some of our family members again.” A look of optimism washed over his face.

Charlie knew that the sentence of life on a decontamination depot, while better than the choice of remaining on Earth, was going to be a solitary and taxing form of existence if there was no end in sight. Sure, they could visit, but if he and Linda knew that someday they would be able to settle on Mars and reunite with their family members, they would have something to look forward to, something to work for. Without a goal on the horizon, days would blur into weeks, then into months, then into years and result in a miserably depressing existence.

Mr. Anderson remained standing, rested his arthritic hands on the desk top, and leaned forward in thought. He slanted his brow as he replied, “It’s too early to make predictions like that, son. As the society on Mars becomes more mature, I would guess something like that could be possible, but I can make you no guarantee of that.” He paused for a second, smiled, and said in an encouraging tone, “Son, you made the right choice. You just saved you and your wife from a terrible death.” He gave Charlie a slight tap on the side of the arm to try and provide him with some hope.

Charlie took a deep breath and exhaled knowing that the choice he had made was going to drastically change everyday existence for the rest of their lives.

“I gotta call my wife…”