Microstory 2373: Earth, October 6, 2179

< > Table of Contents

Generated by Google ImageFX text-to-image AI software, powered by Imagen 3

Dear Corinthia,

I’m relieved that you’re feeling better, but I’m still worried about you. What are your message quotas? Maybe you could send me daily updates? Yeah, I’ll always be a week behind, but I’ll feel better if I can count on something coming in every day. Or maybe that would be even more stressful, because what if you’re too busy, or you forget? It might make me start freaking out. I dunno, you decide. I just want you to be okay. Who else do you have in your life besides Bray? Does Velia help too? Is she someone you can rely on when things are rough? It’s so frustrating being so far from each other. Okay, I don’t wanna be too pushy or overprotective. You live your life however you think you should. In school, we learned about the dangers of living in space. They told us how risky it is just being out in the vacuum, and how lower gravity can impact bones and muscles. But they didn’t say anything about the pathogens that do—or more important, don’t—start going around. You’re in such a controlled environment, which sounds like a good thing, but I guess there are consequences. We’re probably going to experience the same thing here on Earth, with our giant dome habitats. Or maybe the giant part is a good thing.  Perhaps they’re big enough where it’s basically like living on Earth before the poison gases. I don’t know anything about this stuff. Have they done studies on it? Do space colonists have weakened immune systems because they’re not exposed to random environmental foreign contaminants, or whatever? Perhaps someone should be comparing twins for this instead of behavioral differences. I shouldn’t say that out loud, give anybody any bright ideas. For all I know, that was part of what they were trying to study in us.

Thinking of you always,

Condor

Microstory 2316: Earth, August 23, 2178

< > Table of Contents

Generated by Google ImageFX text-to-image AI software, powered by Imagen 3

Dear Corinthia,

My father had to extend his diplomatic mission, which happens all the time—he had already extended it twice before this—but he calls every time, so I was able to confront him about his involvement in our separation. I would have preferred to speak with him in person, but I didn’t want to waste any more time, because there’s no telling how long this will take. We really need that food and the medical supplies, and they just can’t come to an agreement with our neighbors. I believe that he will make every effort to return as soon as possible, though, as delaying a real talk will only give me more time to hear the truth from you instead. He would have rather gotten ahead of the narrative, but of course, we both know that he had every opportunity to fess up, and never did. In the meantime, I’ve been trying to find anyone who may have known our parents back then, but he and I came to this habitat alone a year ago. So far, no one here has been of much help. I did meet a rather old woman who believes that such awful practices were not unheard of four decades ago, and there’s apparently precedent that goes back even further. Back in the early days of space exploration, there were two famous sets of twins who were studied for comparison. One would go up into space, while the other stayed on the ground. That’s how they learned that low gravity changed the immune system, and even genes. There were other twin studies throughout history, such as when one turned out to be really intelligent, and the other not so much. This old woman thinks that these experiments became more ethical over time, but started to backslide as governments lost control of society, and corporations started being able to make up their own rules. It’s hard to know for sure what I can trust about what this woman says, though, as she’s made some more outrageous claims, like that aliens walk among us, or that she once met an immortal mystic man who was born in the nineteenth century. Anyway, I’m quite curious to know more about how Vacuus works. I know that it’s quite dangerous to live on an airless world, but what does that do to people? What kind of laws do you have? Would you call them fair and reasonable? I should think that a mission that included a kidnapped baby would be rife with corruption and amorality, but I truly hope that things have changed since then, and you at least feel safe and happy with the people around you. Write back when you can.

Love (I hope it’s okay to say that),

Condor Sloane

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: October 22, 2398

« < » > Table of Contents

Kivi hangs up the phone, confused and frustrated, perhaps even more frustrated than before she made the call, but now for different reasons. The interrogation of Meredarchos is not going well. There are only a few people in the world who are immune to his psychic abilities, and half of them don’t work for the government, so they’re off doing their own things. The rest are left to stay at the black site, and keep watch over him in tiresome shifts. They grow weary of it, but until they figure out how his ability works, they are the only line of defense against him. Kivi was hoping to get Arcadia to immunize others, but she can’t come back, for reasons she didn’t get into. She did make one crazy claim, which is that generating mental barriers in other people’s heads is something that Kivi may be able to do herself.

“What you’re doing when you say that you’ve picked up the scent of a target has nothing to do with smell,” Arcadia said. “The reason you can find people is because you’re tracking the unique psychic signal that everyone gives off, whether they want to or not. You too have psychic abilities; maybe not as strong as Meredarchos, or even me, but everyone has a little, and you’re definitely better than the average person.”

Kivi is confounded by this. Obviously she knew it had nothing to do with smell. Catching a scent was just the easiest way to put it without having a degree in neurology. Still, psychic is a bit of a stretch. If she can read minds, shouldn’t she have done so accidentally by now? In the movies, if a character has a special ability, it will always surface at an opportune time, especially if we’re talking multiple abilities. Kivi has been interrogating this dark entity for days, and nothing like that has happened to her. Though maybe just knowing it’s a thing will make it work the next time. She’s certainly going to try that before she attempts to protect a new agent from Meredarchos’ intrusions. If she fails, it places someone in danger, but this only puts her at risk.

They’ve been living at a safehouse about a kilometer from the secret one-person prison, which was built into an abandoned mine shaft by another team while Kivi and her team were still looking for the enemy. She makes the drive back, and checks in at the gate. She takes the elevator down, and heads for Meredarchos. His two frontline guards have already moved him to the interrogation room, and placed a dark bag over his head. If this is going to work, he can’t be allowed to sense anything through her microexpressions. She sits down across from him, and starts to operate on instinct. If I were a real psychic, how would I read someone’s thoughts?

After a few minutes, Kivi starts to feel something. Her own mental wall is still there, but now she’s getting the sense that there are two walls. One of them belongs to Meredarchos and Erlendr. They apparently also have to protect themselves against intruders. She looks up to the top. She can see both of them there, on separate corners, scanning the horizon. They’re looking so far in the distance, they can’t even see that she’s right there in front of them. It’s one tall-ass wall, though. As a metaphor, it’s a pretty good one. There’s no way she’s scaling that, and making it to the other side.

She hears a whisper at the base of the wall. “Psst. Come here.” It’s a shadowy figure, holding onto an open door.

“Who is that?” Kivi asks.

“It’s me, come on.” The figure steps a little more into the light. It’s Cheyenne.

Microstory 1213: Darrow Ness

< > Table of Contents

Very little is known about Darrow Ness, a.k.a The Maverick, and that’s saying a lot, because given enough time, pretty much anyone’s story can be uncovered. People are aware of him, and they have memories of their encounters with him, but no individual has enough of an understanding of his life to truly know who he is. First off, there’s reason to suspect Darrow wasn’t always his name, mostly because he doesn’t immediately respond to it; at least not as quickly as most people do. He’s apparently revealed multiple origin stories to those who have asked him about it, all of which contradict each other, so the assumption among people who know him is that he’s purposefully misleading them. He has the ability to travel through time, and he seems to be able to detect death, but there’s one power that he’s never told anyone else about. He can erase people’s memories. It’s unclear what his limits are, but he can exercise this control over seemingly anyone, and he does so to protect his own timeline. Darrow doesn’t erase the memories of everyone, for every thing he does, but he does like to keep himself wrapped in mystery. And no one is immune; not even The Superintendent. Nothing he’s claimed about himself can be verified or debunked. He is a killer, who uses his time traveling ability to assassinate targets, usually upon the request of someone else. This is all anyone knows of him, though again, there’s evidence to support  the idea that he has spent entire timelines displaying no violent behavior. Perhaps the secret to him lies in these alternate realities.

Microstory 316: Disease Prevention

Click here for a list of every step.
Sleep

Disease Prevention is one of the hardest things to accomplish. The work is never finished, and not everyone has access to the same resources. The impoverished population often has ways of finding shelter, water, and even food. They can make clothes out of something, and can carve out some time for sleep. But cleanliness and preventive healthcare are two things that cannot be achieved if the wrong environmental factors are at play. Healthcare professionals have outlined five levels of disease prevention, each subsequent level being more difficult to attain than the last. The first step in creating a population, not entirely free from disease, but protected against preventable medical conditions, is education. People must be aware of the risks they face when engaging in certain activities. They need to know that bacteria can thrive under unsanitary conditions. They need to know how to recognize the signs and symptoms of diabetes, heart disease, and sexually transmitted diseases. They need to know the dangers of alcohol consumption, why smoking is unhealthy, and why exercise is important. This all may see obvious to you, but you probably grew up in a developed nation, and were exposed to a degree of education. But just being aware of the risks of certain lifestyle choices, and knowing what diseases you could contract, is not enough. There is so much conflicting information out there that it’s either hard to trust anyone, or it’s easy to choose whatever lines up with your preconceived notions. One thing to remember is that literally everything causes cancer, so unconditionally cutting out anything you read about that in an article isn’t practical. Preventing disease comes from exercising regularly (steadily, not necessarily intensely); eating natural foods (but not shying away from anything that tastes good: that doesn’t mean it’s bad); and seeking medical check-ups, as feasible. Completely avoid recreational drugs, relieve stress as possible and legal, and—above all—find balance.

Quality of Life

Microstory 312: Cleanliness

Click here for a list of every step.
Intuition

Unlike other stories I’ve written for the Stepwisdom series, for this one, I’m going to be a little bit more personal. I have something called Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder. This gives me a lot of ticks and unnatural habits, but it also demands I be excessively clean. I’m constantly worried about cross-contamination. I don’t like touching something I deem unclean, and then touching something that is clean, because then I have just polluted it. I remember the day I first learned about hand sanitizer; it was as if God reached down and gave me a little kiss. Unfortunately, this discovery also enhanced my need to be clean, because suddenly, it could be achieved instantly, and at pretty much any time. I keep a small bottle of it attached to my hip, and this tends to freak people out, so I just have to ignore their judgments. I grew up in a clean household, though, so I always understood it. We don’t wear our shoes in the house, and we shower before bed, because if you shower in the mornings, then your whole house is perpetually dirty, and how the hell do you not even realize this? I know I have a condition, but come on, you sleep in dirt? That doesn’t bother you? Cleanliness is an indicator of a developed society, one that not every culture has the luxury of. Uncleanliness leads to poor hygiene, and thus disease, but to a certain degree, it can also lead to immunity. It is said that “you have to eat a peck of dirt before you die”. This is true figuratively, but also literally. I always knew that exposure to dirt was important so that my immune system would know how to fight off disease, so I make a point sullying my hands on certain occasions. Always keep your children clean, but let them get dirty first.

Vitamins, Minerals, and Proteins

Microstory 198: (Callsign ‘Operator’)

Click here for the list of every Bellevue Profile.

Following Phaedra Wirth and Tracy Wickham’s betrayal, the scientists responsible for a number of unethical experiments with human subjects decided to change tactics. They were no longer going to choose candidates like Phaedra with moral compasses, and the integrity to make their own decisions, or those like Tracy who were easily convinced to change their inclinations. No, they thought it was best to find someone amoral; a sociopath, and just keep them happy. They were wrong. After progress in the human genome project, and development of a more sophisticated means of identifying anomaly potentials, they were able to locate a woman whose identity was kept secret; callsign Operator. She was not born with special abilities, but her DNA was just chock full of genetic similarities with those who were. Years after Bellevue came out of the shadows, these scientists restarted their program, and performed an experiment on Operator in an effort to compete with Bellevue’s near monopoly on anomalies. The procedure was the most successful one of all; a Generation Alpha anomaly with no need for that pesky stabilizing evolution; an instant Generation One. Unfortunately for them, there was just no way of containing what they had created. Operator developed the ability to manipulate other people’s motor functions. She could not control her target’s mind, but she could move their bodies as she pleased, and most would be hopeless to fight it. She used this to force every single person who knew who she was to kill themselves. She was also able to see the world from her target’s perspective, much like the possession ability found earlier in Starla Wakefield. Her power increased exponentially the more time that passed, whether she was practicing it or not. She later developed the ability to push herself into the perspective of just about everyone on the planet simultaneously. People were allowed to go on about their lives as normal, but would be forced to do her bidding if she wanted them to. Though a few people were immune to her control, only one person possessed the means to find out who and where she was, and to end her hold on others. But this person had been missing since 1995, and would not be able to put the world back together without help.

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: April 1, 2025

« < » > Table of Contents

Mateo was under the impression that when he returned to his regular pattern, he would find himself back in the Snow White coffin; under automatic quarantine. But he was wrong. He was standing up, but it was pitch black, so he had no idea where he was. He could be thousands of miles from home for all he knew. His father was quite obviously a time traveler, but they had jumped through so many years that there was no way to know whether they had also moved through space or not. He waved his arms around, looking for a lightswitch, but accidentally knocked a glass off of the counter.

When the light came on, the room looked familiar. He was almost completely certain that he was in his mother’s new house in Colorado. He turned around and found confirmation. His mother, Carol was standing in front of him. He tried to get away from her, but she quickly wrapped her arms around him.

“Mateo, you’re back! My God, what happened to you?”

He pulled himself away from her. “We both need to be quarantined. Separately.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I’ve been infected with a virus of some kind. I’ve probably already passed it on to you, but we have to try.”

She stared at him for a few seconds before showing determination. “Get into the room at the top of the stairs and to the left.” She left for her own room. “I’ll call Duke. He’ll know how to do this.”

Professor Duke Andrews came over with Leona. Together, they constructed barriers with plastic sheeting. It freaked him out a little. He knew it was for everyone’s protection, but there was a television character years back who would build rooms like this in order to kill people without leaving evidence.

Once they were all finished, Leona came back in with her hazmat suit. “I’ll need to take more samples.” She got to work.

“Leona.”

She looked annoyed with him.

“I didn’t run away this time. I was thrown into the future. That’s where I got this virus.” He waited for a reply but nothing came. “Leona, I’m sorry.”

“Tell me what happened,” she finally said.

He went about explaining everything he went through in 3118; from the dome to the robot, to the self-destructing message, to his father. She then relayed the information to Duke and his mother.

She shook her head. “The files were corrupted. We received almost no data from the machine, except for a series of unfinished equations regarding hyperspheres. But we didn’t think that meant it did something to you. When you didn’t come back a year later, we thought...we figured that you were dead.”

“I’m here now.”

She stopped working for a second and looked him in the eye. “Yeah, but for how long. I’ve always known, but with each passing year it sinks in more that you and I are destined for failure.”

“Well, maybe we can stop it. Tell me about the data. What’s a hypersphere?”

“We believe that the powers that be exist within five dimensional space. That allows them to see time all at once,” she explained. “Or so we think. Like I said, we didn’t get much from it. Which makes sense now that we know the way it disrupted your—what did he call it—pattern?”

“How would someone be able to see time all at once?”

“Imagine a beetle, crawling on the ground,” she began. “You pick up that beetle with a sheet of paper, and you carry it somewhere else; maybe hundreds of miles away. You set the beetle down, and what does it do? It just keeps crawling. It knows it’s moved, but that doesn’t matter. It has no choice but to keep going with its biological imperatives: to find food, and a mate. That’s what the powers that be are doing with you, your aunt, and your father. They’re picking you up and setting you down somewhere else. The difference is, since they see time from an outside perspective, they can move you back and forth within the timestream.”

“So we’re just game pieces to them? Moving us around on a board. For what reason?”

“If these people have any motivations, they would be so far beyond our comprehension that no analogy would sufficiently account for them. Again, it would be like the beetle trying to guess why you moved it from its original spot.”

Mateo nodded, knowing that if Leona couldn’t fully understand what was going on, there was no way for him to. He would have to surrender to the idea that this was his life now. There was nothing he could do about. Trying to figure it out would be impossible without access to the people controlling it. He decided to change the subject, “hold on. Is it April first?”

“It is, why?”

“Happy birthday.”

“That is yet to be determined.”

“Come on, don’t be like that. It’s gonna be okay.”

Professor Andrews entered the room without protection and directed Leona to stick Mateo back behind the zipper. “He needs to stay in there, but it’s pointless for you to wear that. We’ve all been exposed.”

“Leona took off her headgear. “What’s that now?”

“It’s a quick little bugger. It began spreading through the air as soon as Mateo arrived.”

“Oh my God,” Mateo said. “I’m here to destroy the world.”

“I don’t think that it will destroy the world,” Duke argued.

“The robot in the future called it a pandemic.”

“Yes,” he agreed, “you are a surprisingly effective delivery system. Whoever designed this thing had access to genetic data that we are nowhere near achieving. But my guess is that it was deployed on a massive scale, using some kind of weapon. You’re just one guy, and the virus has almost certainly mutated since then.”

“Mutations should be worse,” Leona said. “If anything, the strongest attributes have survived while weaknesses were stripped away.”

“Normally that would be true, yes, but you said that this was first created decades before your arrival?”

“That’s what the robot claimed,” Mateo confirmed. “He played it pretty close to the chest.”

“Like I said, this was designed with a very specific purpose,” Duke continued. “It was likely extremely aggressive on the outset. But once everyone was infected with it, the virus no longer had a purpose. There were no more hosts to attack; no more cells to hijack. But it didn’t die. So, it just sat there, quietly and slowly degrading and losing some of its attributes.”

“Are you saying that the virus would have eventually just disappeared?” Leona asked. “It seems like they would know that, and didn’t have to bother with Mateo.”

“They needed a cure for the virus because it caused infertility. If it ever died off—and I can’t be sure that it would, without more data—humanity might have died off before.”

“Please tell me you’re saying that it’s less dangerous to us,” Mateo begged.

“We have made great strides in medical technology since you’ve been gone, my young friend. It cannot yet predict the future, but it can come damn close. I suspect that the world’s gonna get sick. But it will survive. You have not destroyed us.”

He stayed behind quarantine for the remainder of the day, but the four of them still celebrated Leona’s 25th birthday together. Andrews was correct that the virus Mateo introduced did not destroy the world. As it turned out, it spread like a flu. A heavy majority of the population showed fever, sweating, cold flashes, and a loss of appetite as symptoms. But nobody became infertile as a result. In fact, Duke hypothesized that Mateo had immunized the entire human population so that, if it were ever to be created in the future, it would do little to no harm. Only a single person died from the infection; Mateo’s mother. He shouldn’t have hugged her.

« < » > Table of Contents