Liberia, 2300 AD

The dead dog lay between us. Its ribs and hip bones cast small shadows in the ghostly, blue light from a Lunar Lamp, making it look thinner and more menacing than if it were alive.

"You're going to do what?" Nalo asked, his voice almost cracking.

"Eat it," Riabo said, calmly. "Like our ancestors did."  

"That's disgusting. And not only that, illegal," I said, my eyes flitting from the dog on the paving of the alleyway to my friend's face. "You're joking. You're not going to eat it."

"Haven't you ever wanted to taste meat? The flesh of a real animal?" Riabo asked, as if asking us if we wanted to live in a mansion.  

"No," Nalo said, "not ever. Meat is dangerous. That's why it's illegal. And it's just stupid to eat it. You could die. And make other people die, too."

Riabo shook his head in annoyance. "For thousands of years our ancestors thrived on meat. Hunting was what men did. Real men were hunters, not turnip merchants." He poked his finger accusingly at Nalo. 

"Yes", I agreed, "and our ancestors had diseases and suffered from great pains and epidemics. Ebola is real."

Nalo shivered and I understood why. The old posters and national motto could still be seen on public news screens and Hologram Centres all over modern Monrovia. 

Ebola Is Real. 

Plants Are Our Future. 

Meat = Death, Plants = Life.

In school, they showed us washed-out, jerky footage of the great epidemics of the 21st and 22nd centuries. We learned that when food science advanced enough to make plant-based replacements available and affordable for all, meat was discarded for good. Liberians were healthier now than at any other time in history.

What was Riabo thinking? We were incredibly lucky to live in the post-meat era. 

The typical five-note melody of a city bus chimed from the end of the alleyway, alerting people at the stop of its approach. The melodies of taxis and private vehicles, mostly electronic versions of pop songs, played on the warm night air as they passed us by. I saw the tail end of a soap advert written on the night sky in a bloody red before the ocean breeze dismantled it and blew it overland. 

We were alone in the alley.

I gestured to the dead dog. "Where did you find it?"

"I killed it," Riabo said, proudly. "A real man should kill his dinner."

"You killed someone's pet?" Nalo's eyes were huge moons of disbelief in the shadowy blue light.

"Are you going to eat like men with me, or not?"

"And how do you know it wasn't sick? Maybe it had a disease?" I asked, wanting to poke him a little with the fear both Nalo and I felt.

Riabo snorted. "Stories for old women. Meat isn't dangerous. That's all a lie. If it was sick, it would have died already. I am a real man and --!"

"Ebola is real!" Nalo yelped, then looked around and up at the tall, sleek nanoplast buildings towering over us as if looking for an escape. I hoped no one was peering out of one of the hundreds of balconies, their Micro-Bands filming the three of us huddled over the pitiful corpse and streaming it directly into the next police station. 

I looked at the scrawny dog and then at Riabo. "And how will you eat it? Just hack off a chunk and start chewing?"

"Do you believe I don't know what I'm doing? Real meat is cooked over a real fire. I'm going to grill it." He grinned, showing off rows of large, white teeth.

Nalo suddenly jolted to his feet. "You're crazy, Ri, and I don't want to know you when you're infected! I will tell everyone I have no idea who you are!" He sprinted to the end of the alley, where he stopped and called to me. 

"Hey! Aren't you coming?"

I looked from one friend to the other, and shook my head. "I'll stay with the crazy boy."

I wanted to see how far he'd go. 

Nalo stared at me for a few seconds and then was gone.  I fingered the metal bar I carried for protection whenever I ventured down to the harbour quarter and felt safe enough.

Riabo rummaged in the pocket of his jacket, finally pulling out a stolen LaserLite. He'd already prepared some rags and flammable rubbish in a metal dish hidden in a niche. Lighting the rubbish with the 'burn' setting of the LaserLite, he smiled, looking almost as disturbing to me in the dancing light as the lifeless dog did.

I watched as he set the Laserlite to 'cut' and removed the dog's back haunch with a crack and a short jerk. Dark liquid seeped out of the open wounds as Riabo stripped the leg of skin, revealing pale muscle and joints underneath.

I felt my stomach turn.

Then Riabo held the leg over the fire, setting it on a metal rod. Soon I started smelling a strange odour like none I'd ever smelled before. I can't say it was unpleasant, but the thought of where it was coming from made me cover my mouth and nose with my hand.

I still didn't believe he would go through with it. I still thought it was a bluff and he was attempting to impress, just like when other boys jump from the roofs of the floating hotels into the ocean.

But it was not bluffing. He took the leg from the metal bar and bit into the hot flesh, ripping it away from the bone with those large, white teeth, chewing and finally swallowing.

"Mmmm. . . the food of our ancestors. Delicious." He took another savage bite, eyes closed in concentration, or pleasure. "This is life, not plants."

I watched him eat most of the leg, disgusted and fascinated at turns. Then he looked at me, the underside of his mouth and chin strangely shiny, and offered me a piece.

Out of a type of morbid curiosity, I leaned forward and pinched off a small bit, looking at it before I put the tiny morsel cautiously into my mouth.

It tasted awful. Like burnt gloves. 

I spit it out when Riabo wasn't looking. He consumed the rest of the dog himself.

That was the first -- and last -- time I ever tasted meat. Even during times when I was hungry and alone, as I was often in my youth, I never was tempted to fall into barbaric ways like Riabo had been. There were other, more impressive, ways I proved I was a man. 

About a year after the dog, Riabo was caught red-handed consuming a snake he'd killed along the side of the highway that stretches into the hinterland. They locked him away in a mental facility and saying he was a danger to both himself and society. 

He was. 

Ebola is Real, and we are so very lucky to live in the post-meat era. 

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A/N  This is a slightly extended version of 'The Lucky Ones' which was my entry for the "Futuristic Africa" prompt 2018 from Ambassadors Africa. 

People can contract Ebola in a number of ways, one of the most common being consuming the meat of an infected animal (antelope, monkey). In this story, Ebola stands in for any number of diseases and health issues that plague Africa.