It was 1985. A company called Schandox discovered a cure for aging called Holy Grail. They said it would make people live for hundreds of years. It works after 12 doses spread out over two years. And that’s it. You might live a thousand years.
First, Zoos gave it to their animals. They would save money if the animals lived forever. The animals were healthy, and none had died of disease or old age since the Holy Grail.
In total, it was tested on thousands of animals,10,000 adults, and 4,700 kids, for ten years before it was given to the entire world. That is a fraction of one percent of the population. After ten years, the people who consumed it appeared completely healthy, so scientists said it was safe. As far as everyone was concerned, everybody should have it before it’s too late.
Government health organizations wanted to wait for more results, but people didn’t want to wait anymore. Since death was then preventable, people accused governments of murdering people by withholding the Holy Grail. There were riots in cities. People were killed.
One man who was 62 named Engel Best sued the country of Engla for making him an orphan, a real kick-in-the-face to all the kids that lost their parents.
People worldwide protested until, finally, in March of 1995, governments and Schandox agreed to give it to everyone. Even those in the governments that tried to restrict it wanted it, and they got it first. Then old people and sick people. Then middle-aged people. Then the rest.
About 9 years later, when most adults reached their 6th year, there were rumors that the original test subjects were getting sick. The government debunked it as propaganda and arrested anyone who spread such misinformation. The hype died down for a while.
Another 7 years passed, then something went wrong. Very wrong. The adults all started getting very ill all at once.
Adults were full of benign tumors and precancerous growths from chemicals used in foods, food wrappers, clothing, and hazardous waste dumped into the environment. They made a toxic world. An average body could have lived a normal life, but the Holy Grail gave tumors and pre-cancerous growths more strength too.
The evening news reported that thousands of adult test subjects were all dead, and that governments around the world covered it up. At first, world leaders denied the truth, but they eventually admitted to it. Their excuse was they didn’t want anyone to panic while Schandox and other drugmakers were researching an antidote to the Holy Grail. They never got the chance to finish the antidote.
It was just one horrifying day after another. Hundreds of billions of people died in a few years. There were bodies everywhere. Terrible smells burned my nose and made us all sick every day. We wore clothes around our faces for months, but it didn’t help much.
Most kids didn’t have many tumors or precancerous cells, so we survived. Everyone stayed the same age they were when they finished their doses. The youngest are stuck in 2-year-old bodies. The babies that never finished their full dosages grew slowly and now look like preteens, so there is hope that those of us who are stuck small will eventually grow.
With gas masks and yellow suits on, groups of teens, both boys and girls, checked neighborhoods by doing “corpse sweeps.” Drivers helped remove bodies. Some were burned. Others were buried in mass graves or even dumped in the oceans. It took almost a year. The smell of burning flesh haunted us for a long time.
We took care of the corpse workers because they were so torn up every day, feeding them the best foods and scouting for more safety equipment, trucks, and gas. They are now honored; we call them Knights. They even have a holiday dedicated to them: Day of the Knights. They saved us all.
Once the adults were gone, everything stopped. There was no one to guide us. It all happened so fast, and we weren’t prepared. There was no food left in stores except for gross canned stuff like canned silkworm pupae, creamed armadillo and possum, brown bread, and pork brains. Wells no longer worked because there was no electricity, and city water was contaminated. The world grew wild again. Money didn’t matter anymore.
Our town was renamed Maricita, named for Gomez Maricita that led a crew that labored for over 4 years, building a wall around the town with lookout towers and a front gate. There are always armed guards on the towers. Other places weren’t so lucky as us.
No one will cross Gomez. No one. Anyone that does not obey the laws is banished. Out in the wild, beyond Gomez’s protection, there are cruel groups called trops that will do worse than just kill you.
No one talks about it much, but we all have an understanding. It was a terrifying horror watching our families get so sick and die, heartbroken and dreambroken. The bodies, the smells, the darkness, and loneliness. Sometimes I wake up screaming in a cold sweat.
Those are the times I am the most thankful for Don León, a lion that also received the Holy Grail that a group of us rescued cub from a nearby zoo, along with the other animals that were mostly set free. Don León did not finish his dosages too since he was an experiment for the antidote. He is now a Guard of Maricita, though he stays with me because I shared my rations with him for so long.
It’s taken a long time to get used to the world, but the new normal is constant change. I know I will be sad forever. We all will be, all who survived. But you can be very sad and still smile.
The stars are brighter now. I never knew there were so many stars before the lights all went out. If every star is a sun, there must be a gazillion other people out there in space, just like us. I wonder if they are stuck in a world that went really wrong too, and if our sun gives them hope.
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