Terraform

Mission Complete

Sydnee stood in line at Starbucks waiting to order her regular coffee with extra cream and sugar. She was standing behind two teenaged girls taking a selfie. One of the girls was shorter, a brunette with glasses, her hair pushed up into a messy bun on top of her head. Her lips pouted into the duck face as she posed. The friend that was with her was taller and had short blonde hair with the right half of her head shaved off. She was the one holding the phone out since her arms were longer. She had one eye closed winking, and her tongue poked out between her teeth. Both of them held up the peace sign. Sydnee stared at the backs of their heads thinking how ridiculous they both looked.

"Hi!" The blonde one abruptly turned and faced Sydnee, her smile showing almost all 32 of her pearly white teeth. "So, um, we kind of want to take a picture with the Starbucks symbol in the background." She stood there and continued to stare at Sydnee with the smile plastered onto her face.

Sydnee sighed as loudly and as obnoxiously as possible and rolled her eyes hard, but stepped to the side.

"OMG." the brunette whispered to the blonde. "You asked nicely, what is her deal?"

Sydnee began to open her mouth and spew something offensive to the two millennials, but an older gentleman that was sitting at the front of the Starbucks began to cough violently. The older man was sitting down, one hand to his chest, and the other trying to cover his mouth. He suddenly stood up and began gasping for air. It was as if he was choking. Sydnee was in her senior year of nursing school, she knew the man wasn't choking because of the fact that he was coughing, which meant his airway was not blocked off. She began to head towards him to assist, but he began projectile vomiting all over the table in front of him.

SCREEEEEAACHHH An orchestra of chairs scraped against the floor, the noise filled the room as people abruptly stood to move away from the older gentleman. As everyone gained distance from him, Sydnee sprang into action.

"You, call 911, NOW!" Sydnee directed her attention to one of the gaped mouth employees behind the counter. The employee fumbled around in her pocket but pulled out her cell phone and began dialing.

As Sydnee reached the gentleman, he was doubled over, gripping the sides of the table, gasping for breath.

"Are you ok? Do you have any medical conditions? Take any medications?" she started to reach out to touch him, but he snapped into an upward position, and gripped her shoulders, digging his fingernails into the crease of her arms.

"What's wrong with me?!  What's happening?! I can't see!!"

The man's eyes had turned red, dark burgundy blood red, and there was no presence of a pupil. Sydnee gasped.

Suddenly phones began to buzz and chime simultaneously. Everyone began checking their phones, even Sydnee felt hers buzzing in her pocket. The man was still gripping her shoulders and had begun crying and uttering incomprehensibly to himself. Sydnee guided him to a seat to try and settle him down.

"It's going to be ok, just calm down sir, help is on the way." She looked back to the counter at the young employee she had instructed to contact the authorities. She was wide eyed and pale, she was just shaking her head while holding the phone to her ear. Sydnee walked over to her.

"What's going on, did you call 911, is an ambulance coming." Sydnee asked

"It was busy." The employee barely whispered. "You need to check your phone now." The employee had cupped her hand to her mouth as if she didn't want anyone to hear her whispering.

Sydnee pulled her phone out of her pocket, and there was the ALERT notification.

ALERT: PANDEMIC SPREADING RAPIDLY THROUGHTOUT THE US, SOUTHERN EUROPE, EAST ASIA, AND NORTH AFRICA. WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION CALLING IMMEDIATE ACTION TO ALL RESIDENTS TO SELF ISOLATE IMMEDIATELY UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE.

Sydnee immediately went to the internet and every news report showed the pandemic.

How is this happening? How is it spreading so fast?  Everything was fine just this morning. This doesn't make any sense. She thought.

Suddenly the blonde girl with the shaved head began coughing, at first a deep throaty cough, but then more violently like the man, then followed by the vomiting. This time Sydnee saw firsthand how her eyes turned blood red in the middle of her spewing her breakfast all over the floor.

Everyone began frantically running out of the Starbucks.

Keep calm Sydnee, don't lose your cool. Get to your house to isolate yourself from others.

As she ran out of the Starbucks following the crowd, the streets were in complete an utter chaos. People were running everywhere, yelling, screaming, and crying. Others were beginning the coughing fits, or spewing vomit. Then there were the ones that had the blood red eyes screaming that they couldn't see.

One particular little girl whose eyes had turned blood red, turned in Sydnee's direction. The little girl has big brown curls all over her head, her caramel skin had cracked and looked dull, as if it was void of blood. She began walking in Sydnee's direction. Sydnee froze in fear, stood in shock by the sickness she saw in the girl.

"It's because of you." The girl said pointing at Sydnee.

Sydnee turned and sprinted to her car, jumped in, turned the ignition and drove to her house. Somehow through all the chaos in the streets she made it.

She ran inside, turned and locked the door, closed all the shades, ran up to her room, and turned on the TV. There was nothing but static. She looked at her phone and there was a notification. She opened it and it read...

SYDNEE. OPERATION TERRA ERRADICATION SUCCESSFUL. WE ARE COMING TO GET YOU.