"That's the end of the conversation, Dr. VJ." A man in his mid thirties, with overly gelled hair and a crisp black suit mumbled through a corner of his mouth, his teeth chewing an expensive cigar on the other side.

"But, sir. This experiment is not a piece of cake, we're not ready for human trials yet. There can be endless side effects. We could potentially harm their genome, with that comes various auto immune disorders, cancers, teratogenic deformities in their offsprings and...and..." A tall man, with a long white coat nervously rubbed his fidgety fingers.

"And super powers?" The man with the cigar raised his eyebrows.

"Maybe or maybe not." Dr. VJ admitted, sagging his lips down with a slow and sideways​ nod. "I'd like to say a success rate of barely 1.01 percent."

"That's enough green signal for me."

"You must be out of your mind. How can you possibly do this to any human?" VJ slid his metallic chair backwards, an ear numbing rung filled the otherwise gloomy silent room. His hands gripped the edge of the glass table top. "I didn't sign up for this nonsense. I quit."

"You can't possibly back off now, can you?" The man slowly rose from his seat straightening his suit and collar and proceeded towards the doctor. Pointing at his chest, he chuckled, "my dear VJ, if God had doubted himself, do you think he could've​ created this marvellous gem of a creature called homo sapien?"
His pointing index slowly relaxed to correct the doctor's collar eerily.

VJ fell back with the man's every new movement. Those kind eyes he had always seen on him, were now nowhere to be found. In their place, glimmered a pair of insomniac, blood shot eyes.

Echoing sound of his footsteps faded when his foot met something behind. Before his mind urged him to run, he was caught by a pair of burly hands. Blue uniforms and black belts -was all he needed to figure out.

The guards obeyed the man as he commanded them to take it slow. "Easy boys, you should respect the scientist who's going to change the face of humanity in the near future."

His eyes darted back to the doctor, his toothy grin wide and twitching,
"my friend, do you remember the subsidised health camp and the free workup we hosted the last week?"

VJ didn't need to understand anything further, his brain had connected all the dots. The psychopath probably injected 'the white goo' into every other worker's body, and even worse, their wives and children.

'What have I done, in the name of science? God forgive me.'

"No no, my old friend." The man clicked his tongue helping the doctor stand, "it's not the time to mourn, it's the time to rejoice."

That's when he sowed the seeds.

•••••••••

(Two weeks later.)

"Ladies and gentlemen, my heart goes out for all those people out there who are fighting this virus. Strongest are the ones who stand even when their legs are broken. Our lady Pristin is forever young, you are fighters and she shall protect you." His gelled hair was sleek and neat, his demeanour on the dais rather endearing. A wave of loud applause haunted the otherwise silent amphitheatre.

'Such a charmer!' VJ thought.

Radial spokes of seated chairs converged at the central podium. VJ saw a couple finding their way through the maze. A curly haired woman in an attorney coat and a skinny guy with khaki jacket and a big camera hung around his neck, to VJ's eyes they were unmistakably familiar.

"Did we miss something?" She panted, hurriedly sitting on a seat beside VJ.

Her disheveled hair, crumpled skirt, remotely bleeding lipstick immediately reasoned why they were late. On other days VJ would of teased them both for hooking up in the janitor's room, but today his mind was nine track, too tired to talk about such a silly thing. "No."

"And, once more 'your' Nova-Gen has successfully created an antidote. Thankfully, we can spare some of our funds for the distribution of this antidote 'free' of cost...yes, you heard it right, free of cost."

Another wave of applause, this time more louder and longer.

"That bloody bugger!" VJ cussed, his fists slowly tightening.

"Oooh. Somebody's pissed off." The woman said, but instantly patted on VJ's shoulders. "Get ready for the drill VJ. No weekend holidays this month for you. You'll be working your ass off in the lab."

VJ sighed internally, at the woman's misunderstanding of the whole situation. But he had to hold his little secret, if not the consequences were far from the worst.

"Come on man, cheer up." The skinny man nudged him softly, "we'll grab some pizza right after this boring press meet." He constantly kept clicking his camera with several angles, which used to annoy VJ. But that day he was too drained to voice it.

"And oh..." The woman cleared her throat, "I am getting married VJ. I mean 'we' are getting married," she almost squealed drumming her shoes like an enthusiastic kid, gaining some stares from the other journalists and delegates seated around them.

"Finally." VJ rolled his eyes and gave her a small hug and then congratulated her skinny-journalist- would-be. "I was starting to think the other way around, you know."

VJ abruptly flinched as his name was called to address the meet-up.

After hesitantly walking down the aisle, he stepped on the dais.
"Greetings everyone. I'm Dr. VJ, the scientist behind the antidote. And I...I..." He stammered, his heart disagreeing to lie anymore, beads of fine sweat shimmering his blood drained face.

His hands squeezed the glass podium when he saw his wife's face, her crimson lips trembling and eyes quivering. Nozzle of a small revolver pointed at her neck by a pair of black gloved hands made him weak to his knees. One stupid move, would have killed her and their baby. His eyes longingly took in her baby bump before he looked back at the audience.

"I am enthralled to share with you our research. Our team has worked hard during the last few weeks to come up with an antidote. With this antidote we could potentially fight this so called 'super-bug' which has become the kill monger of Pristin. Now coming to the virus itself, it's a highly diverse virion, has potential to morph its genetic material according to its surroundings with continued mutations."

VJ shifted his gaze to a display screen which showed a graphic imagery of life-cycle of the proposed virus. "Even after curing this disease, we should anticipate some long-term side-effects like mental breakdown, dementia etcetera..."
He gulped, the thought of it shuddered his heart. The antidote was not actually an antidote at all, it was a catalyst - a primer to speed up the process.

His heart wrenched, his throat an acrid sore of lies. He was appreciated with an undeserved standing ovation for several minutes. 'God forgive me.'

Clever! That's how he watered the saplings.

•••••••••

(Thirteen years later.)

A banner which read 'Proud survivors of super bug' -was decorated on a varnished wooden wall. Several plasma screens were arranged to display the live feed from the speech. Gelled hair, now grey, but still sleek and neatly combed appeared as a big pixelated face on the display screen.

He cleared his throat and straightened the mike. "Ladies and gentlemen, we triumph today. Today was the day when our Pristin was declared super-bug free. You are strong, I keep saying this but you are my heroes."
He hung his head low for a brief moment, as if he was mourning. "I am deeply saddened by the fact that some of the survivors have gone rogue, crime rates have increased immensely. Homeless people run amok in the town, robbing, raping innocent people, our people. We need to stop this."

A big round of applause echoed across the convention hall. A plump woman rose from her seat and raised her hand, "Sir. Nester Ollen. May I..."

He nodded pursing his lip, a mike was passed to her by some volunteers. "I lost my little girl, ehh height -barely fourteen..." She sniffed raising her hand to denote her daughter's height. "She was brutally killed by these rogue mongrels. Needless to say, she was a super-bug survivor herself."

"My deep condolences," Nester added. He then took a long breath to announce something. But there was a big boom of sound gaining everybody's attention.

Through the glass panes appeared the blooming umbrella of fire reaching up to the sky. Its tendrils and tongues began wrapping the hall, the temperature rose to the scorching levels. Broken shards of glass panes fell across the chaotic hall.

People ran erratically to find a safe outlet. Nester coughed, losing his ground from the dais and tumbling down the steps. The podium creaked and leaned to fall down, catching his leg underneath. "Somebody... please help me."

A man almost looking like Nester himself, with gelled hair came over and stood at his feet. His shadow dancing against the rattling and crunching fire eating away the wooden wall.

"Big brother," the doppelganger crouched, "it was always about you, isn't it? The name, the fame. Now take a look, your castle of dreams is crumbling."

Nester sighed before an episode of cough overtook him, his eyes pleading. "Don't do this. I beg of you."

"Don't strain yourself. It's time." The doppelganger took Nester into his lap, caressing his hair gently. "You don't worry, Brother. I'll end what you started. Now rest." His hands slowly clasped his gasping mouth, so tight it smothered him alive. Nester's heaving chest slowly stilled, the crackling of burning walls overtook the silence of death.

The death.

"I, am death. I am God. I create, I kill, I am the harbinger of war - the war of gods." The doppelganger rose to his feet, his eyes reflecting the red of fire around him.

His gaze slowly shifted to a floating silhouette emerging from the blazing fire, which appeared as if the phoenix had risen from the ashes only to serve him.

"Master," the silhouette of fire kneeled in front of him.

"Hell Fire." The doppelganger tilted his head, "I command you to burn this tower and everything that comes its way." He elegently scurried out of the place.

He put on a saggy face, wore a sympathising look in his eyes and coughed holding his chest as he emerged from a huge steel air-vent; his face smeared with thick soot, his hair disheveled.

"That's Sir. Nester Ollen!" A group of rescue personnel swarmed toward him. They ushered him into an ambulance.

An iridescent green trail took shape in the sky. The man honing the green trailblaze staggered to find balance and fell on the roof top of the tech tower.

'Perfect!'

Nester closed his eyes, his heart at peace whilst many pairs of gloved hands caressed his body lying on a stretcher inside the ambulance.

That's how he reaped the first harvest.

He's onto the second harvest now.

I need to stop that. 'We' need to stop that.

••••••••••