The World as We Knew It
2025
Rhea chuckled at her daughter as she danced around in her fairy wings and lime green tutu, her dual pigtails bouncing around perkily as she giggled. “Mama!“, the five year old bundle of joy squealed as she waved her wand around, tapping the heads of the army of stuffed animals scattered around the living room. “Did you see Mama?!” Rhea nodded along and smiled. “Yes baby I did. Are you going to turn them back?” she asked with all seriousness. The little blonde head tilted as her cute little nose scrunched up in contemplation. “Only if they play nice. Mr. Squiggles was mean to Tina the Tiger so he had to be changed into a froggie, and since Newt and Moot don’t like to be left alone and they also were mean to Tina the Tiger they had to be turned into pretty princesses. The only one who was nice to her was Cerbie, he gets to be her best friend.” She listened to the in-depth workings of her daughter’s stuffed animals society, and her determination of their wrong doings and proper punishments. She nodded sagely at the girl and smiled. “It was right to make sure they learned how to treat a lady like Tina the Tiger. Boys are supposed to be nice to girls, just like Daddy is to Mama right? But we both know Mama would put Daddy in his place if he was mean, don’t we?” Her daughter nodded big but put her hands on her hips and scowled up at Rhea. “But Daddy is the bestest and the perfectest so he wouldn’t do that.” Rhea smiled at her stubborn little girl who so loved her Daddy, he would be home soon enough and she loved nothing more than seeing them together at the end of the day. “Mama has to go start dinner, Daddy will be home soon. Do you want some Disney on while I do?” She nodded and tucked the mischievous stuffies in the corner before curling up on the couch with Tina the Tiger and Cerbie under each of her arms. While she turned on Disney+ for her daughter she went to the kitchen to work on dinner with the news playing quietly in the corner. She was used to news of a possible war with Russia, updates on the continued issues with Covid 19 and all the other local rigmarole running rampant in the city.
As she was pulling the lasagna from the oven, she heard the telltale squeal of ‘Daddy!’ coming from the other room informing her of her husband finally getting home. Wiping her hands on the apron she had slung on when she began cooking, she went to the arch separating the two rooms and leaned on the jamb as she watched the love of her life scoop up their daughter and swing her giggling form around before kissing her on the cheek and setting her down. His piercing brown eyes landed on her next, a soft smile touching on his lips as he moved to her next for her hello. “Hello good looking, whatcha got cookin’?” Rhea chuckled at his usual cheesy greeting while she tipped her chin up for a kiss. “Lasagna. How was your day, Handsome?” She was confused by the almost immediate ashen look to overtake her normally cheery husband’s face at her innocuous question. He turned to look back at their daughter to make sure she was back to her show before pulling Rhea deeper into the kitchen gently by her elbow. “What Adam? What is it?“, panic evident in Rhea’s voice at the look on his face. “Something is coming, Reh. Something bad. We all thought Covid was bad, this thing...it’s a killer, and a quick one. There is hardly any time to announce an outbreak before its spread so far and infected so many that there is no hope of controlling it. We’ve barely been able to keep it quiet and after today, we won’t be able to. Dr. Thean says it’s so complex that there isn’t a chance to find a cure in the time we have. The gestation period is days, and it has a 100% mortality rate. We have no clue where it came from, or how to stop it. We don’t even know if anyone is even immune to it.” Every word he uttered just got worse and worse. Rhea couldn’t wrap her head around it. “What are we going to do Adam?!” she whisper shouted at him, panic evident in her voice. “Dr. Thean and a few others are going to work on it in a bunker, their families will be there too. We’re on the short list. It’s going to be okay. I promise.” Rhea nodded and hugged him close, trusting Adam explicitly to protect them. Four months later, only three people were left alive in the bunker, and one of them was their little five year old left clutching Cerbie, tears bleeding through the ashes on her face as she watched them burn her parents with the other bodies that had succumbed to Thean Virus, or what commonly became known as The End Virus.
