Equalizer

by DarkBird

It’s funny really, how things can get so screwed up. Take for example the quick and easy Slim Trim, first introduced into the market in 2004. It was supposed to be the greatest thing since liposuction; became an instant hit in most developed countries right from the start. You see, they had to get around the Martin-Briggs legislation of ’04, so instead of actually manipulating the genes of their “clients”, they instead produced a variation of the Jonah virus.

You might ask what the hell a Jonah virus is. Well, if you’d just give me a sec I’ll go ahead and tell you. Without going into any great detail, the base of it is that they take a special virus, only one that’s empty--can’t make ya sick you see, and they fill it up with something useful. I guess you could call it a message in a bottle--but only if you think stupid shit like that makes you sound smart or is funny. Anyways, as I was saying, they basically turned a Jonah virus into a weight loss program. When you get right down to it only the richest, and arguably, fattest people shelled out their dough for this treatment. Very expensive for only losing a few pounds, if you ask me.

Well, these scientist types at Hyman Corp, that’s the company that first marketed this thing, they thought they was all a bunch of geniuses or something. I remember their televised speech when they was nominated for some award that scientists like to give each other; one of them said something about tackling the common cold as their next project. Heh, as if anybody with two-cents worth of sense, excluding those who wanted to kiss up to these assholes, would think that would be funny.

Hmmm…what’s that? You want to know what the point to all this is? Well calm down kiddo, I’m getting to it-but sometimes a good story ain’t always one of them shoot-em-up vids you kids watch all…okay, okay. Sit down, I promise I’m almost done…just relax and listen. Where was I? Oh yes, the scientists.

Seems these fellas didn’t quite figure out that nature doesn’t like to be screwed with, nobody thought their little bug would ever mutate into something else. But it did. Didn’t take very long neither, maybe a little over a year before the new bug appeared, and not very long after that before everything went to shit. First it started to take off a bit more weight than it was supposed to, the average shmo started to look more like a twig or something.

Oh, wait. I forgot to tell you about how the virus started to spread like a plague. All those fancy scientists couldn’t keep this thing from spreading from one person to another. Kinda funny, really. All those rich pansies shelling out family fortunes when the average moron is getting it for free. Okay, so it started to infect everyone--‘cept for a few lucky losers, and then it started to shave off a bit more weight than you paid for. Some might say they were getting a bit more for their money, but wait, it gets better. This thing started to eat away people’s brains.

Well, eating them up is a bit too strong, it was more like making them a bit smoother. Huh, well I don’t know why but it does make sense if you think about it. I mean, the brain is just a bunch of fatty tissue--but I guess those scientist types hadn’t really thought of that. Didn’t take long after that for that strain to start spreading across the globe. As they say, “It’s a small world afterall.” Weird how those infected seemed to devolve or something.

You probably won’t remember this, but those guys in Atlanta did an autopsy of one of those fellas before this thing had really spread. They compared his brain to that of a monkeys’-which in a way they kinda do resemble monkeys. They don’t understand the concept of clothing at all, but evolution is taking the slack for that I suppose. Maybe it’s the virus or some kinda of hyped up version of Darwin’s, but they seem to get hairier all the time, guess you’d need a fur coat if you no longer had the sense to wear a shirt or pants. Wonder how long it’ll be before they start growing tails--that’d be funny, a bunch of giant, anorexic lookin’ monkeys ruling the world.

But getting to their intelligence, they are stupid as shit. I remember a couple of the suited up scientists who scoped out a few of the victims' houses found whole families dead. Seemed they starved ‘cuz they couldn’t figure out how to use a doorknob. Well, I really can’t see these things carving out the niche regular people’ve done. After all, it was man’s intelligence that saved his ass from the food chain--which these fellas sure don’t have.

Once the real “wild” animals figured out they could roam a city at will they started to take a liking to snackin’ on our skinny hides. After three years of hiding in this shelter the U.S. was so kind to build when they still worried about nuclear winter, the only thing that’s kept those monkey boys from going extinct is that they breed like a mother fucker. You thought them welfare cheats had big families? Shit, when I’ve had to go on patrol I can tell you I’ve seen half a dozen of them runts hanging on to one bitches’ hide. Yeah, it’ll take a bit more than natural selection to snuff their existence out.

Now the question is what’s gonna happen to the rest of us; who knows if, if ever, the bug will die out and let the rest of us move out of our comfy little cave. Nuclear missiles, biological weapons, super viruses. . . funny how all it took to bring the world to its knees was some diet scam that was rushed through testing. Pity really. Well, I guess you can’t make an omelet without breaking a few eggs.

Equalizer copyright 2003 by DarkBird.