The Heart-Shaped Locket

It is the Year of our Lord 2235, we just survived what scientists and astronomers has deemed as "God's cure" for the Earth's over-population problem and excessive gross misconduct...a meteor shower like that in which happened in Sodom and Gomorrah, except on a global scale. However, this batch of meteors came from a sector of space where it was considered the "Dead Zone" because no life seems to make it beyond this zone, a zone much like what we called here on earth the "Bermuda Triangle" where countless planes and ships have vanished after entering the area to never be heard from again. These meteors from the "Dead Zone" would prove to be more deadly than any falling meteors and asteroids to ever hit the earth because what was discovered hidden within them not to mention the sheer size of some of them, some as large as a cow. You see, as the meteors started entering the Earth's atmosphere, the outer layer is burned as it heads towards earth and usually lands somewhere such as in the desert where it remains dormant. However, until now we never ventured to find out what happens if it made contact with water until it was infecting us all because we didn't know what was hidden underneath the surface of the outer layer of the meteorite that when exposed to water and evaporates causes spores to become airborne and anyone who inhaled or any water source that it came in contact with would only cause the spores to germinate, such as in your eyes and mouth areas in which are usually wet...it feeds on the nutrients and irons contained in the fluids we have in our bodies. So as we perspire as in exercise, these unseen spores would attach itself to our sweat and enter into our bodies within our pores accelerating its growth rate in which it takes over the host. Eventually, the host dies of what seems to be a new strain of the flu having accelerated flu-like symptoms unlike any strain that ever existed in human history. So deadly this strain is that causes the host to begin to lose sight within a few days of exposure, next the sense of smell then that of taste. Eventually, the host dies due to no cure for this unknown virus.

This new virus was discovered years ago, by accident by a young biologists, Steven A. Kurig ( who happened to be my uncle ) who stumble upon a small meteorite while camping in the Dakotas and decided he wanted to view the meteorite under a microscope to see if any form of life can be found growing among the pieces broken off this meteorite. As he placed pieces on a slide for viewing sweat from his brow fell unto the lens next to the piece of meteor and it appeared that "spores" seemed to rapidly expand within seconds of making contact with his sweat on the lens.Curious to know what was going on, he decided to do some research meteorites at local library and the town folks began to share with him about a case about a boy who had recently died after having contact with a meteorite but no one wanted to believe that there was a connection but this boy's father who related to him how the boy saw what appeared to be a shiny black rock in a nearby creek and he picked it up and placed it next to his bed. The meteorite was allowed to dry overnight and the boy began playing with the meteorite and began losing his sight, smell and eventually taste and at the time no one knew it was due to this "shiny black rock" in which was later discovered to be a meteorite. So, he soaked his meteorite in some saline solution, removed it from the saline solution and placed it on a napkin to airdry on his desk next to him well into the evening and after seeing that the meteorite had become dry, he began playing with it and he began to feel disoriented and confused. He would later see the connection between the meteorite and what happened in the case of the little boy, however at this point was too late, the young boy died and no one, but his father, whom everyone thought was going out of his mind, was able to make the connection between his death and meteorite that was still sitting next to his bed when he died...in fact they buried the meteorite with him.

Fearing for the worse, he relentlessly worked on finding a cure and placed a sample of his cure in a small vial and hid it somewhere but left a clue to a secret ingredient hidden within the cure as well as the location of the vial hidden inside a heart-shaped locket in which was given to him by his late mother. He started to replicate this cure for himself and others just in case but suddenly a fire broke out in the lab, killing him and destroying all of his notes pertaining to his findings pertaining to meteorite. Years later, I would stumbled upon a small box that contained a diary and this heart-shaped locket, however little did I know just how valuable this piece of jewelry was until we experienced the meteor shower that wiped out nearly 2/3rds of Earth's population in a matter of months and now they are searching for my late uncle's heart-shaped locket that contains a clue to use it to save mankind from certain death because no one is immune... Most of the laboratories was looted and destroyed in search of the vaccines and medicines that my uncle knew would not work and he left notes for me to locate and find a former colleague of his to replicate the cure before its too late, however it seems that someone else was thinking the same thing and got to him first. I found him dead in his laboratory and someone ransacked his office in search of my uncle's heart-shaped locket...