The First Wave |Year 2036|

Fion

I don’t have much time left at DCD Research before I will be fired, I think, while hurriedly using my loaned lab station. I need to take a secret strain derived from my research to test on myself. After I’ll test it on the world as the first phase before I can successfully target Beninsprout Corp. Like all things, I should practice, or else I will fail. My research has never yielded results, because everything important is more or less unstated in any of my papers. The reason I am choosing to edit a virus instead of writing one from scratch is the difference in freedom and potency compared to the time cost. If I wrote something entirely new, I know I could make it perfect, but it would take more than 30 years of my life to get everything right.

I’m learning that the only benefit from working myself to the bone every day during my years of work is the persona I’ve built. Up until now, I’ve done amazing work and have passed every barrier I have been given. Everyone can believe it because I worked day and night. As a result, staying to work deep into the night is the norm and I can do things I am not meant to be doing with no suspicion. My replications of the strain in the lab were successful and I started to take and test it on myself at home. I’ve sent samples circulating through my blood and I tried to select and remove the strains that were building strong immunity to the drugs I was testing. I’ve also kept note of my added mutations' success rate in not causing replication errors.

Between international and domestic medical organizations, they have all seeing eyes, but I’ll take advantage of everything through fire that I’ve learned that the medicine and research field has been built from. Their dual focus on profit and only the current deadly viruses and diseases will enable me to go under the radar. My strains can not be fully masked, but no one would be interested in pursuing my purposefully harmless creations anyway. Out of the scientists who monitor and people who catch the cold from my virus, I am sure that maybe one or two people would find something out of the ordinary from something so unassuming and non-lethal. I figure that even those people will still not see the threat. Every director or important higher-up is only interested in illnesses that are killing now and illnesses that will get them rich through medical monetization.

For the longest time, I’ve been thinking through the perfect criteria to follow for creating the zombie virus. The virus needs to be highly infectious above all else. If it can infect the whole world quickly, then I do not need to worry as much about a cure because everyone will be busy surviving in a newfound worldwide disarray. Additionally my virus should evolve continuously and quickly, so any found cures may be rendered useless in time. The long game will be mine as well if I significantly shorten the time between virus generations. The key is to create a flood unlike anything ever seen before that breaches all of Earth’s floodgates or defenses in a single disaster. That’s what I will use, water. Water is fundamental for all life. Humans will take it in through food or drink, but there is so much to think about. Water has three forms liquid, solid, and gas. This isn't limiting; there are so many things you can play with here, the weather and all of Earth's natural processes. The Earth is 71% covered in water, so a virus that thrives and spreads in oceans and freshwater will be my key to success. Zombies can pick up the slack by moving inland to spread the virus toward more landlocked areas. Still, the main effort has to come from water because, from every calculation, it could be multiple days to weeks for a zombie to make decent progress inland toward the middle of the continent from the coast.

It is mid July when I complete everything I need for the world release phase one, so I take an airplane ride one weekend to a different part of the world to release it. It would be beyond stupid to release it in the same place I reside because it could compromise my position. Might as well go somewhere wet, like the United States city of Seattle. On my night walk, I decided to drop one secure, untraceable container that would soon open into the tides of the ocean and one into the sewage system, and then I am off back home to wait for the outbreak and demographic data. I'll acquire crucial insights and plot the next moves, being undeniably closer to releasing the final product.