Spring 2010
The world ended on a Thursday.
Not that anyone noticed.
It didn't end with a bang or a crash. There was no shock wave from a massive explosion, fallout, or radiation. There was no benevolent deity that snapped his fingers to remove the blue marble from existence.
None of these things.
The world ended on a Thursday with the soft tinkling of broken glass against the disinfected metal floor of the Defense Solutions Laboratory in Arlington, VA. It was a small test tube, not a full sized beaker. A slender receptacle for blood storage that fell less than three feet and, just like that, the dominoes began to topple.
"Shit," Quinton Fairmount cursed under his breath. The clunky rubberized Tyvek suit felt like it was three sizes too big on his 5'4" inch frame and every time he turned around the air intake hose attached to the rear of his suit seemed to be catching within a six foot circumference.
They used to have self contained air systems but, Quinton's Supervisor, Ben, had thrown out his back one too many times and now the department had been saddled with these bulkier older model suits that hooked into a separate air system in the clean rooms. And, it was this ventilation issue, Quinten would later reason, that caused the whole mess in the first place.
The culture was a small but, virulent strain of Pandora9 a DNA modification virus that, but was harmless, but, when combined with primate blood resulted in unpredictable host mutations.
This particular .1cc sample had been combined with .1cc of of a test subject's blood. A small framed blond girl that was trying to earn extra money to cover tuition at Marymount University. She had been more than happy to donate the healthy blood that would end the world in exchange for $50 and a free bag a Keebler Cookies.
Quinton hadn't taken the blood but, he'd mixed it with the anti coagulant to make it suitable for the mass spec. He hadn't taken the blood but, he'd mixed the sample that would end the world. But, in all fairness it was his job. It was Quinton's job to explore weaponized applications and, as the vial hit the floor, all he could think was how much this shit cost an ounce.
Ben Feinstein was none too happy when he saw Quinton waddle into decon in his Tyvek suit. He was less happy when his chief weapons engineer hit the large red button to the left of the decon door that flamed the floor of the lab.
"What got knocked over?" Ben raised his voice to be heard of the roaring of the individual gas flames under the floor of the lab.
Quinton shucked the Tyvek suit as simultaneous sprayers coated his body and clothing in a mist of industrial grade disinfectant. Once the appropriate appropriate amount of the sterilizing liquid had been dispensed the sprayers shut off automatically and Quinton grabbed a sealed scrubber pad and ripped off its plastic pouch before attacking his exposed skin with the practiced efficiency of 461 working days with only one day of sick time taken. He spent 120 seconds per arm, counting out loud, and 240 seconds per leg before flipping the switch to be air dried by the blowers recessed in the wall.
Ben tapped the glass to the decon room the whole time; irritated with watching the sample of Pandora9 dissipate in small gas flames of the lab floor to his left. Quinton was deliberately not looking at him eyes averted to his task at hand.
When the decon door finally slid open with a pleasantly soft 'whooshing' noise Ben was on Quinton in a matter of milliseconds. "Did you get any on you? Were there any tares? What happened?"
Quinton chewed his bottom lip absently as he moved from Ben's piercing gaze to grab his canvas work pants off the hook outside decon and slip them on over the basketball shorts he wore in the suit. "No," he said simply.
Ben rifled his hands over his face and through his slightly too long raven hair. "Do you know how much that stuff costs?"
And, there it was. Quinton knew it had been coming; the almighty dollar. Ben didn't really give a shit about the science, the applications, the molecular mutation copy rate. He gave a damn about the bottom line. But, then again, that was his job. Quinton raise his gaze to meet Ben's piercing emerald eyes. "Eighteen thousand sixty four dollars per cubic centimeter for manufacturing costs. And, I dropped point one cubic centimeters diluted in suspension so; one thousand six dollars and forty cents. Take it out of my paycheck."
Ben was startled. Usually Quinton was far more submissive than this. Ben was, momentarily, without his words. When he found his voice again, it was dangerously low, "Go home."
Quinton sighed, sneezed, and sighed again. "You know what Ben," Quinton gave him a half smile, "I was already headed that way. Not feeling so good anyway."
Later that day Ethel Barabis would come with the cleaning crew to start the sanitation of Quinton's lab. She would shove Quinton's Tyvek suit into a biohazard bag for incineration. She was in a hurry and would never notice the four millimeter separation between the air intake valve on the back of the suit and rubberized housing. The tiniest of cracks that allowed for the passage of room air into the suit when it was in use.
When Quinton finally made it home that evening he was exhausted. He had stopped by his Mother's to take her for their Thursday evening ice cream and dropped her at the Bingo parlor early so she could take down the "old biddies." He had no idea that he had taken his work home with him and shared it with his mother. Or that she would take it with her to Bingo.
Barbara, Quinton's Mother, dominated at Bingo that Thursday evening and was congratulated on her twelve hundred dollars in winnings by half of her church group. Donna Peltzer gave Barbara a tight hug before she had to leave.
Donna had to leave early to make the redeye to Chicago where she would make a midnight connection to LAX before she boarded a flight for Paris. It was her sixty-fifth birthday treat to herself.
When Donna arrived at LAX that night at 11:09pm she was starting to feel poorly. To pass the time she busied herself by making conversation with any passer-by's that would talk to her.
Quinton died in his sleep that Thursday night at 11:48pm. Alone. He would never live to see the fruition of his work.
Donna Peltzer passed away on her flight. The corner in Paris, Jehan Marquis, deemed it a case of the flu and pulled her body, on a gurney, off the plane and through the back corridors of the airport past two airline lounges.
In retrospect Jehan probably should have been more careful. But, really, it had all been over at LAX.
The world had ended before midnight on a Thursday.
But, no one really noticed. Not for weeks.
