The virus spread quickly. That wasn't our biggest problem though...The real problems started after the release of the much-anticipated vaccine.
Some refused it; That's when the government stopped financial assistance unless a vax-19 certificate was produced; That got people motivated and for those who weren't - House to house checks, a blast with a taser and quick vaccination from an attending military medic and, job done.
But a month later...Everyone started dying...Nearly everyone. Those who had avoided the vaccine didn't. No, COVID-19 wasn't the problem, the vaccine was; That, and the aftermath of billions dying.
I was one of the lucky ones; I'd refused the vaccine and managed to avoid the government enforcers.
Lucky. Sometimes I didn't feel lucky; Piles of rotting bodies didn't make for a nice environment, no power, water, food supply...Survivors were mostly very aggressive; Starvation and thirst is a powerful motivator I guess; Humans just want to live...At least the looting had stopped, no one cared about stealing Nike's...Food and water was more important. There was hardly anyone left after a few months though.
I had skills though; Occasionally I thought about those who had called me a crack-pot for prepping, being a prepper...But it doesn't matter now, they're dead and rotting in the street somewhere, and I'm not.
I'd hardly see anyone, or allow myself to be seen. I spent twelve hours a day simply trying to provide enough food and water for myself gardening, hunting, scavenging and planning ahead. I was going okay too, for months...Until everything started dying...
...My vegetable garden, grass, trees, plants and animals...Everything...It wasn't long before I was starving to death and not feeling very lucky at all...
...Everything was white and it was quiet, all except for the beep, beep, beep of the machine hooked up to my finger. I was alive, I thought distantly, in a hospital?...That was the first day of the rest of my life; Life in The Bubble.
I'd been brought here by a crew looking for survivors, slowly brought back to health and now was an active member of the community. It was called The Bubble*, but the last bastion would have been a fitting name also.
The brainchild of an eccentric billionaire-prepper, the self-sustaining habitat was capable of housing five hundred people, apparently indefinitely. There were only sixty seven of us though. The last vestige of human life? Who knew. This seemed the last bastion of humanity though.
Air, water and food was all created within and waste was either recycled or expelled outside but very little was wasted; Waste wasn't something we could indulge in any longer.
A year after being found I'm thriving here, living a very basic life, but alive and grateful.
No one knows what happened to the world outside the bubble, but it's like a lunar landscape out there. The vaccine virtually killed off the human race, but what killed everything else?
Some say the vaccine was too effective and after attaching the virus at a cellular level within humans it morphed into something altogether different and began attacking all organic cells...But that's just speculation - No one really knows.
We know however, just how fragile our existence is within the bubble. Each living thing within is linked to and dependant upon to the other; Human, plant and animal alike. We are careful not over-use anything and there's no excess...We use what what we need and replace it for the future...A little like we should have done out in the world, when we had one.
Life is a fine balance now, and all life hangs in the balance. Sustainability isn't just a popular or politically correct catchphrase in the bubble...Our lives depend on it.
Design and create your ideal life, don't live it by default - Tomorrow isn't promised.
Be well
Discord: galenkp#9209
This ten minute writing throw-down was prompted by the word bubble. I wrote the piece in ten minutes then cleaned it up, typos and spelling errors et cetera, leaving what you see here. I took the image at Gardens By the Bay - Singapore - probably the most impressive gardens I have ever seen.
