The Sequence

No one knows how the pecking order formed. When it came to saving lives, it fluidly morphed with power shifts.

Cruelty became the new norm, as the pandemic had reduced the town to a mass crematorium.

At first, the powerful and the influential were not afraid. They were untouchable. Champagne and caviar were temporarily on hold. This was a major inconvenience for sure, but they could live with it. Until they couldn't.

The equalizing effect of the virus began to devour without discrimination at an exponential rate.

Shaken out of their comfort zones, the powerful decided to add value to the long ignored, hard-working scientists. These researchers attained an invaluable status they never had received earlier.

These were the knowledge repositories, they were the discoverers, the inventive ones. Slowly, everyone realized they had to turn to scientists. Knowledge alone could liberate them from the deathly grip of fear.

The fragility of these experts did not go unnoticed. They were not immune to the disease, and saving them from extinction was tantamount to every person’s survival.

“What is it that grips us like vice?”

Merciless to the sick, the infirm, the people were not averse to getting rid of them. “They have lived long enough,” they said about the elderly. “It's all about priorities now. We need to live out our lives.”

The hospitals now had bars all over to keep in the sick. To counter overflow, malls, recreation halls, and other social gathering places became make-shift hospitals. Incinerators were stationed in parking lots to wipe out every trace of the dreaded virus.

Amidst the puzzlement, impatience grew like a giant shadow all over. They say only the strong are the survivors, and you could witness this. The strong survivors assumed the mantle of leadership without permission. The once-powerful now quaked in their boots.

They found her strange as she constantly mumbled. “attaaaggtt tataccttcc caggtaacaa accaaccaac tttcgatctc ttgtagatct,” but her voice only added strength to the incoherent chaos.

Seized with malaise, gripped with fear, and heightened with a sense of mortality, the townsfolk milled around without knowing what to do. The sickly smell of death pervaded all around, although it had become a new normal.

“If I survive,” she thought, “I’ll never forget this smell.”

No one could fathom what was unspooling in front of their eyes. Death loomed large, and the researchers like all others were dying one by one.

She was the last one left. The secretive team of work knew something about the virus that the rest of the world did not. Carefully piecing the puzzle together, they were nearly there until the virus wreaked havoc on everyone else. She had the foresight to hold on to the genetic sequence. She had filed this valuable information away in an innocuous brown paper box. The others who knew how to connect the dots were erased forever. The onus rested solely on her now.

She fabricated a tight wad out of the valuable genetic string, and tucked it into a golden heart-shaped locket before turning the lights off once and for all.

This was a town with neither infirm nor aged. Some succumbed to fear itself, while the others were dispensed with. After all, the epidemic ceased to discriminate. People decided to make some hard choices.

She continued to summon strength to keep alive. Despite the fact she had lost loved ones, humanity within wanted to help others. “This is what it currently looks like,” she cried. “They change rapidly, but we can put a stop to this once and for all."

They paused for a brief minute, wondering what she would say.

She could not muster enough strength to stand up. Crawling on all fours, she tried to help with what she knew. She weakly unspooled the string, “attaaaggtt tataccttcc caggtaacaa accaaccaac tttcgatctc ttgtagatct.”

People turned away, almost disgusted with her inchoate mind. "It's a good thing the militias do not see her," said one.

"Dispensable crazy, I wonder who kept her alive this long," replied another.

Misinformation darkened the depressing world. It introduced a sense of doomsday, hung like a millstone, and continued to bring the worst in people.

Conspiracy theories abounded all around. But the pandemic gripped everyone, and this was no time for theories. The able ones covered from head to toe had little peepholes for eyes. Everyone became suspect, even a cough seemed to hold the potential of death.

The power shift could not be more apparent. Instead of anarchy, the able-bodied attained a supreme status and took matters into their hands. They put all the effort to nurture and protect the ones with knowledge. The rest were riding on a roulette of luck.

The voices grew louder.

“Scientists, where are they?”

“Keep the researchers safe, for they’ll find the way.”

“How did we get here, and how will we overcome this?”

This time around, the pandemic was not like the others.

If only someone could understand this, if only someone could help. The researchers, scientists, virologists, and doctors were quickly becoming extinct. The ones alive were valued beyond measure, and the rest of the population became dispensable. Yes, the disease had taken its toll, and tolerance became extinct. To prevent further infection, they began to put incoherent and incomprehensible people to sleep. Soon after, a quick cremation obliterated their traces and the those of the virus residing in them.

She weakly uttered her words, “I know what it is, attaaaggt tataccttcc caggtaacaa accaaccaac tttcgatctc ttgtagatct.” The people lost their patience, as they felt she had finally succumbed to incoherence. If she had value, they would have saved her. She just wasn’t making sense, and they interpreted that the virus had reduced her brain to mush.

“Another useless casualty,” said the man standing to the ones watching. “We only have to keep the ones with knowledge to get us out of this situation.” He shook his head, and with pity pulled out his weapon of mercy.

“Stop, I can help,” she implored.

He briefly hesitated, but when she began the incoherent chain, he decided for her and for the people.

“attaaaggtt tataccttcc caggtaacaa accaaccaac tttcgatctc ttgtagatct....attaaaggtt tataccttcc caggtaacaa accaaccaac tttcgatctc ttgtagatct...”

"Prepare the funeral pyre," he commanded.

"Sir, do we save her locket?"

In spite of facing imminent collective death, human greed still held optimism. This vice seemed stronger than the virus.

“Spare the valuable, and burn the rest,” he responded with barely disguised contempt.

The fire lit her face with an eerie glow as she cried with urgency.

She opened the locket to unfurl the scroll with the genetic sequence. "I beg you to see what is truly worth saving." The underling raced at her like a raging bull to grab the necklace with his gloved hand. He gingerly placed it in the ever- growing pile of valuables. As the paper slowly spiraled down, he carelessly tossed it into the fire.

The vision of the executioner’s finger leaving the trigger in the slowest motion was the last thing she saw, but she continued to recite the genetic string from memory.

“a t t a a a g g t....aaaah!”

Author's Note

An article in sciencemag is the source of inspiration last year in lockdown. If I've learned anything in this pandemic, it's that human greed and overconsumption are as bad as dangerous viruses.

We owe much to the hardworking scientists and researchers. Yet, there is much mistrust in the community at large. https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/01/mining-coronavirus-genomes-clues-outbreak-s-origins

A year later, in trying to piece together data, Dr.Jesse Bloom a viral evolutionary geneticist, from Seattle noticed missing data.

Even at this moment, important questions regarding transparency, coordination, or plain oversight are only minimally addressed.

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-01731-3