"Deadly Knowledge" by S. B. ´Kinko´ Hulsey

…And yet the dogs still barked and the children still played.

However, the man considered, they knew not of the impending doom that was coming to them. They knew not of the full story telling of the inevitable self-destruction of man. The horror that had been imprinted on his mind that they had not. In their ignorance, they had happiness and peace of mind that the man had lost long ago.

The children would eventually fall prey to It when they reached adolescence. Ah yes, the cruelty of the world, he thought. To die so young with so many ambitions. Indeed, they had been guarded from the terrible secret. A secret he had been entrusted with as he took care of the children for as long as he could.

Or, as long as he was alive.

The dogs, without the benefit of man, would receive heavy losses to their number. Some, confined to houses, pens, and the like, would die of hunger and dehydration. Others would loose the will to live, not having a master to love. Yet their race would still live on.

“When will we see our parents again?”

The children’s innocent voices rang through his ears, a painful memory he could not seem to loose, no matter how hard he tried. Especially since he did not know the answer, but it still would be a lie if he told them that. The answer depended on if there really was an afterlife.

He glanced down at his arm, the one he carefully hid from the children’s view. The black and yellow splotch was growing, spreading up towards his shoulder. He knew now that he didn’t have the natural resistance others had begun to thought he had. It was no doubt what his ailment was: It.

Oh, please, if You really are there, end my suffering now, I beg of You! he thought, glancing pleadingly towards the sky.

In all his pain and suffering at seeing family and friends die around him, he had begun to wonder if there really was a God, having been more of an atheist. Yet It seemed like it was almost as if a God had been angry with mankind and sent It down to Earth. His mind was searching for a different answer from what he knew was the truth.

He glanced to a rifle hanging on the wall, bitterly recalling he had been too afraid to pull the trigger. To end it all. He found himself wanting someone else to do the job for him, for he was too cowardly to end his own pain himself.

Examining himself in a mirror, he noticed the shade of sickly yellow in his cheeks, wasted away from his ordeals. Black-rimmed bloodshot eyes stared back at him, sunken into their sockets. His lips were thin and a slight shade of blue as he shivered slightly from the cold, biting wind that carried the unmistakable scent of death. A slight moan escaped his lips and he staggered back from the mirror, putting a hand to his eyes.

Then, he looked up, the laughter of the children meeting his ears. They would suffer It’s wrath as well…. Glancing again to the rifle, a fleeting thought came to him. To end the lives of the children so they would not have to face It- no! He was not a murderer.

Yet It seemed to be. Striking down a soul hen they were just getting lifelong dreams. It spared no one but the young children, having been triggered by the new chemicals and hormones released at adolescence that remained for the rest of a lifetime.

“Why must we stay here?”

Their innocent minds and questions haunted him. What would they do when he was gone, too? They would ether die from It or some other cause that he might have been able to prevent. Their deaths would be his fault. Their end would be because of his weakness.

Suddenly, his stomach was racked with pain, as if a red-hot knife was plunged deep into his gut. It was all he could do to not scream with pain has he lay down in his bed, groaning.

Bitterly he recalled that It tended to strike its hardest while It’s victim was under sever stress.

He knew he didn’t have long now. His strength was slowly seeping from him.

A bird sat on the branch of a tree, twittering rapidly, unaware of the death that was rampaging around it. A part of Nature.

Yes, it was Nature that brought this upon man.

Man had tried to control Nature. Man had tried to play God.

And now Man was suffering the consequences.

A sickly, nauseous feeling washed over him, the pain slowly spreading through his entire body. Yes, Nature’s wrath was strong….

If Man had been wise enough, Man would never have tried to mess with Nature. Changing the very building blocks of a living species for Man’s own benefit. By doing so, Nature’s delicate balance was upset.

A disease intended to kill a different species had gone bad.

Very bad.

A numb feeling began to spread even slower than his agonizing pain. His eyes stung with water behind his thin, closed lids, trickling out. It felt as if the tears of pain were taking some more of his strength with him. It became hard to breathe, and every breath brought cold, death-like air that rattled harshly into his chest.

It had been a genetic manipulation of the influenza virus to kill malaria-holding mosquitoes. Yet not only did It combine with the malaria, It then spread through the human population, the reaction swift, sharp, and deadly.

So many now lay dead from th foolery of genetic engineering.

His mind now felt numb, the rest of his body feeling cold, yet hot with a sort of feverish sense. His life flashed before his eyes as he now fully absorbed it.

This was where he was going to die. And this was how.

A desperate panic took a hold on him, but it slowly faded along with the rest of his thoughts.

Why…?

He faded into darkness, and then was no more.

And yet the dogs still barked and the children still played.

But those children would fall to It without the same knowledge that the man had.

Technology, which was Man’s strength, pride, and power, had become ultimate Man’s downfall.