Neon Green

She wanted to scream but knew she needed to save her breath. She swallowed the urge and continued running. She could see the Embassy gate in the distance and silently prayed she could reach it before the mob caught up to her.

She finally reached the gate and one of the guards opened it for her. She tumbled in and the gate was closed behind her. The mob reached the gate moments later and threw themselves against it, seemingly oblivious of the army and artillery they were facing.

The army dropped back away from the fence. The mob coughed and spit all over the gate and fence, cackling gruesomely, then ran off.

Kitty breathed a sigh of relief and sat down on the ground to catch her breath. A team dressed in hazmat gear ran to the fence with apparatus that looked like pressure wash equipment and sprayed the fence and gate. Then they sprayed Kitty where she sat.

“You okay, Kitty?” Damon asked.

“Yes,” Kitty replied. “They didn’t get near me.”

“You need to be more careful. I don’t want to lose you.” He put his arms around her soaked body. “You want to rinse off and get changed and meet me in the conference room?”

Kitty nodded and they went their separate ways.

Half an hour later, Kitty arrived at the large conference room. There were already several people waiting for her and more trickling down the hallway in their direction. When all were assembled, Damon addressed the group from the front of the room.

“Kitty had a close call today. She got out the tunnel okay but had to come back through the gate. That means the vaxxers will be watching us more closely. We will all need to be on the lookout. Kitty?”

Kitty stood up and faced the group. “I made it to the lab without being seen. I got most of what was on our list. I think we have enough to continue the research. Joe?” One of the men in the audience approached her. She handed him a backpack. “Good luck.” Joe took the backpack and left the room.

Kitty continued her update. “The White House is still locked up tight. Doesn’t look like anyone is going in or coming out.”

Someone in the audience called out, “I heard the president still claims she had no knowledge of the effects of the vaccine.”

Someone else chimed in, “It looks like they got what they wanted, but how long can they go on locked up in there? They can catch it just as easily as we can.”

A third voice sighed, “I still can’t believe our own government would do this to us.”

Damon cut off the comments. “Okay. We all know how we got here. After decades of making the American people more and more dependent, many believed everything they were told. Now they’re seeing the result. We just need to make sure we stay strong, and hope that, one day, we can find a cure for the vaxxers; or hope that their weakness will overcome them and we can live freely again.”

There was a rousing cheer from the audience. “Let’s get ready for sundown,” Damon said, and the meeting disbanded.

*****

Damon and Kitty headed to the makeshift lab they had managed to jury rig in the six months they had been there. Joe had already gone through the backpack, inventoried the new items, and was organizing them on the shelves.

“Did I get anything that can help?” Kitty asked.

Joe smiled at her. “I think we have a lot to work with. The problem though is the same one scientists had when they were trying to come up with the vaccine. Time. We don’t have enough time to test it out. We could end up making matters worse instead of better.”

Damon and Kitty nodded their understanding. “It would be a lot easier if we had the backing of the White House,” Kitty mused. “We’d have access to so much more!”

“Oh right!” Joe exclaimed. “They’re the ones who got us into this to start with. Why would they help us?”

“Because,” Damon replied, “they didn’t really think it through. They thought the vaccine would make them more powerful and wealthy if they had a bunch of mindless sheep. They didn’t know the it would cause people to become monsters.”

Joe waved his hand toward Damon. “It was a rhetorical question. I just still find it hard to wrap my head around what they did. But I need to get to work before the sun goes down.”

Damon and Kitty’s next stop was the kitchen. They greeted the staff. “How’s it going? How is the food supply holding up, Lily?”

A young woman stepped forward. “Not too bad. Wish we had more meat, but other than that, okay. The chickens are still laying. The garden is doing well. The conservatory is perfect for the garden. We just planted a new crop. It should be ready by the time the current crop is used up.”

“Good job, Lily.” Damon patted her on the back.

“I’d better get back to fixing dinner,” Lily said. “It’s almost dark.”

*****

Nighttime was something one had to fortify themselves for in the post-pandemic world. The violence took on a new turn. Because their eyes were sensitive to the light, the vaxxers came out at night, and ran rampant, not caring who they hurt or what they destroyed. The unaffected increased the guards around their fortresses—in this case a former embassy building—and had the disinfecting sprayer handy.

Millions of people who had rushed to get vaccinated, for fear of contracting the disease, ended up with something far worse.

The unproven vaccine, which seemed at first to be a God send, ended up affecting the vaxxers mentally as well as physically. The symptoms began with a brief bout of super power, followed soon thereafter with a steady decline in physical strength. The mental decline, however, was the worst. The vaxxers turned violent, crazed, and out of control. One disturbing side effect was the way their eyes shone neon green when they were at their craziest.

The unvaccinated retreated in fear. There were communities of them all over the U.S., trying to find a solution. The craziness was transmitted through bodily fluids, so the vaxxers were constantly trying to get close to the unvaccinated and infect them.

The only saving grace was that the infection was very short-lived on surfaces. It had to be pretty much direct and immediate contact. So Kitty, Damon, and the other unvaccinated people slipped out through a tunnel during the day to get supplies for their research or other things they might need.

*****

Kitty retreated to the room she shared with Damon. She sat on the bed and began to finger the heart-shaped locket she wore around her neck. She took it off, opened the locket, and stared at the photos inside. On the left was a photo of her parents in younger, happier days, before they had succumbed to the virus. On the right was herself and her identical twin sister Kenzie when they were just two years old. The two girls had gotten matching lockets for their 16th birthday.

Even though they were identical in looks, they had very different personalities and viewpoints on life. Kenzie was among the first in line to get the vaccine. Since then, she had been trying to convert Kitty, and Kitty had been trying to keep track of her sister in case they were able to come up with an antidote.

Thoughts of her sister weighed on her all night as she kept vigil at the fence; and kept her awake when it was her time to sleep. She knew she had to see how Kenzie was doing.

*****

The next morning, she told Damon she was going to make a supply run. She didn’t mention Kenzie. She wasn’t entirely certain she could find her sister, but she was determined to try.

She stayed in the shadows, sneaking around their old haunts, their old neighborhood, their old friends. It took time on foot (as any form of transportation was rare) and it was mid-afternoon before Kitty found her. Kitty watched her for awhile, assessing her behavior and waiting for her friends to leave. They eventually left and Kitty decided it was time to confront her sister. Maybe she could reason with whatever was left of the real Kenzie.

Kitty snuck in close enough to see Kenzie clearly but behind a wall so Kenzie couldn’t see her yet. She immediately noticed that Kenzie no longer wore her pendant. Kitty was sad, and momentarily distracted. She pulled off her own pendant and the chain came out of the link, falling on some scrap metal that was on the ground.

Kenzie looked over and saw the slight movement Kitty made. She walked toward Kitty. Kitty froze momentarily but knew she needed to get out of her hiding place before Kenzie got there and she was penned in.

She dashed out from behind the wall and stayed at an arguably safe twenty feet from Kenzie. Kenzie smiled in a way that could only be described as grisly. “Kitty! So nice of you to come see me!” She walked slowly toward Kitty.

Kitty began to back away. Kenzie said, “I’ve missed you. You have a hug for your twin?”

Kitty backed away further. She was so enrapt in the vision of what was once her sister that she tripped over some debris and fell backwards on the ground. Kenzie continued approaching and held out her hand to Kitty. “Want a hand up?”

Kitty rolled away and scrambled to her feet but Kenzie intervened. Even with her waning strength, she was able to reach out to Kitty and grab her in a strong embrace. “I’ve missed you,” she reiterated, her eyes glowing neon green.