Lockdown 2

The early 2020s were hell, now that we're all entering 2025, life has seemingly restored to normal (despite how expensive everything now is). Many are already forgetting the horrors of the "You-know-what" virus, that people still wince upon hearing about. It caused a lot of trauma across the globe, as people were suddenly locked in at home, watching businesses close, shops and restaurants shut, some of them for good! It caused an economic crisis (one we are still recovering from) and resulted in a generation of kids who've missed out on crucial years of education. The consequences of COVID (there I said it!) has had such an unfathomable and insane butterfly in society, that it is downright terrifying to imagine the future we are about to step into. Yet 2024 hasn't been too bad, it's been better than the early years of the 2020s at least. I'm glad to see that literally nobody wears those God awful surgical masks anymore, not knowing what people were thinking or feeling was something out of a horror movie. That's why people are scared of clowns, you know? Because of their make-up; people saw smiling faces that weren't really smiling. The happy face paint was confusing for many kids, as sometimes the party might've been angry, sad or frustrated at his job, yet the fake, red bright smile on his face would say different. So only seeing the eyes of everyone had the same effect on me personally, in fact a lot of people felt the same way, for it resembled the appearance of a masked robber, trying to hide his or her face for nefarious reasons. I know this must make me sound kind of snobby or frightened of the world, but it was true! This time also created a society of germaphobes too! Everyone distanced from each other, nobody dared to hug or shake hands, lovers were told to restrain themselves from intimacy, it was so sad, horrible and terrifying. Yet humanity recovered by 2022 and almost three years later, things are looking bright! But what if the pandemic of 2019 was just the beginning?

Nobody knows when (if ever) the next big virus will hit us. I might be next year in 2025, it could be in 2029 (ironic) or further ahead perhaps 50 or 100 years from now. Who knows? I like to think such an awful, unfathomably depressing thing like that will never happen again. That would be naive, because this isn't the first (or last) time the world has faced such a devastating disease like this before. We had the black plague, the Spanish flu, Ebola and so many others before COVID. It's impossible what this next virus will be, you can imagine a zombie outbreak of you like, or perhaps a deadly cold that makes your nose bleed profusely, maybe it'll be a cough so deadly nobody can breathe while infected with it. It could be something entirely new and unexpected. Whatever this next virus will (might) be, it could (potentially) extinct the human race! Perhaps not instantly, more likely it will end us slow and painfully, taking its sweet time as society adjusts to this new virus. People will lock themselves away, spending all their time online instead, as the world outside is run by soulless machines and robots, that go outside and deliver to houses. Extinction may come in the form of loneliness, because if simply breathing the fresh air is infectious, how on earth will partners meet and (most importantly) reproduce? Because in this dark future, to make love is to risk death. It will be like how the Black Widow kills its partner after mating. Now that's a horrible thought, isn't it? Most people won't risk that, no no! So they'll date online, through virtual reality video games or simulations. Maybe there will be a reasonably decent replacement for intercourse, one that everyone will subscribe to. As the human race dies out, because of this mysterious virus or by in-celibacy, nobody will care, as this may take a few hundred years, because mating won't die out instantly, but subtly throughout the centuries. Then the world above ground might be overgrown with foliage and wildlife. Perhaps mother earth will finally reclaim the lost world she had created, spreading her roots over the many villages, towns and cities that mankind has built. Maybe this is inevitable, because some scientists out there claim that it is actually us, human beings, who are the real parasitical virus that has infected the planet. I mean really think about it. We created Global Warming, we've destroyed rain forests for profit and waged wars across the globe. Perhaps it's time we step aside and let the earth recover, so a new form of life can take our place.