Wife and husband no longer on the same page
This one started out as something like Imhapless' "For the Greater Good" and morphed into a much longer and drawn-out story. So, we'll call it "inspired by" I couldn't just leave it at the obvious conclusion for our MC, so it's broken into three parts. "Future Pharming" will have two parts, and then "Future Farming" will be the third part and published after this one as a continuation, but also standalone.
The concept and some of the plot lines were devised post-Thanksgiving dinner with family and friends. A bunch of people sitting around contemplating 'what if.' Most of the group is in the medical field, and one has the exact same credentials as our MC. Their 'science' had my mind racing. As I asked pointed questions about their field of expertise, and what might happen if it all went to shit, I started to make notes. This is the result after three months of writing - rechecking, clarifying, and re-writing.
Therefore, I have some friendly warnings, and one thing I must stand my ground on. Fortunately, it's a free story site, and since I'm trying to entertain you, I get to do it.
The virus and subsequent pandemic in this story closely mirror the real-life virus we've all recently endured. If revelations or actual accounts, in any form, of the real-life virus negatively impact you, you may want to skip this story.
Cancer plays a role in this volume and volume two, "Future Farming." Same as above, if you are negatively impacted or triggered by that, skip the story.
This fits best in the LW category, but there is very little sex, and mostly it's implied. There are parts of this story that resemble "In the Name of Science," by
Laptopwriter
. I have reached out, to offer an early read and to see how the author viewed my story compared to theirs but have not had a reply. After further consideration, I believe only the basic premise and one character's profession come into play.
** As always, all comments and criticisms are welcome, EXCEPT with this one, negative or incorrect comments concerning the actual science in the story. I'm sorry, but after long hours writing it, making sure the content was plausible, and consulting people that are actually in a position to verify it, I will not accept comments, masquerading as gospel, or questioning its validity. "That sounds pretty far-fetched" (acceptable) versus "Any human with a brain knows nothing like this could ever happen, and therefore it's a culmination of conspiracy theory." (unacceptable). I trust the professionals, and in this case, many are family members who simply kept me within the guardrails of my fictitious story. Suspension of disbelief is often important to authors, myself included. The truth is, there are a lot of people who believe things completely contrary to other people so suspension can often be an exercise in futility.
Of course, you can always private message me. I may read it or not. I may even reply. Since I'm putting the finishing touches on a novel about the decline and eventual collapse of our public health and public education systems, after three years of research, I'm happy to accept the role of subject matter expert.
[Copyright 2023, all rights reserved]
Relax; it's just a story, people.
Year 2030
Since the great pandemic of 2020, the virus had mutated eighteen times. The latter strains caused little more than cold-like symptoms. Vaccines were still the preferred deterrent according to the World Health Organization.
That worked out well until 2025, when two members of 3-letter government agencies provided definitive proof that US and foreign pharmaceutical companies, were themselves creating new, more deadly strains of the original virus. It all came to a head, when an unexpected, prominent whistleblower showed up at a congressional hearing, providing direct evidence that the top three U.S. Pharmaceutical companies were doing the dirty through gain-of-function, under the guise of getting ahead of future viruses and saving lives. That whistleblower had my exact credentials, although he was about ten months ahead of me on his doctorate.
Things snowballed from there. Official documents revealed at least twenty members of Congress and members of the president's executive team knew about what the big pharma companies were doing, including all eight members of the fed task force on Early Detection of Viral Epidemiology (EDOVE).
There was talk of criminal charges against those senators and congresspersons, even impeachment of the president, although none of those charges ever grew legs because opposing sides characterized them as political witch hunts. The three big pharma companies all filed for bankruptcy due to massive public boycotts of most of their products - medicines - and lack of consumer confidence.
In 2026, a new major scandal pushed the virus and vaccines into the background, when new allegations about Bill Yates, one of the wealthiest men on Earth surfaced. He'd made his fortune in the tech industry, and spent a considerable amount in recent years, pushing plant-based foods, while buying up farms in America's heartland at an alarming rate. Some top-level officials in his organization were accusing him of tainting the nation's food supply, and people - everyday American consumers - were listening.
For several years, the public lost confidence in their government, too. The 2028 elections for Congress and president had the lowest turnout since 1890. Cable news called it 'cocooning,' and instead of people fighting their government, like in the earlier part of the decade, the general populous just became indifferent.
I was sure my career would never go anywhere but did everything I could to keep my head on straight. I'm Steven Boswell, by the way. My wife, Sarah, needed a lot of comforts, and I found that to be therapeutic even when I was running on empty. She was chief of nursing at Memorial Hospital, and she had been smack-dab in the middle of the shit show, since day one. Now the government had announced a new virus, just as my wife and the world were catching their breath.
Besides patient care, she now had to deal with disgruntled and wary family members demanding access to their loved ones and, worse, demands for unconventional medicines and treatments. Some became violent, and the facility would have to go on lockdown.
By 2028, even more problems arose. The new virus, and specifically, the booster designed to deal with it, was causing a mutation in the lining of the stomach in males, but in females that mutation was causing a previously unknown Endometriosis, of the tissues inside the uterus and cervix.
There was a twenty-two percent increase in ovarian cancer, in just that first year, since the mutation had been discovered. Women were being prescribed a variety of meds and homeopathic to help purge the tissue during the menstrual cycle, as was supposed to naturally occur.
Sarah and I had weathered it all. She was my rock, and I was hers. Back in 2023, she'd gone to a dark place, and it only got worse over the next year. I'd gotten her to finally agree to some counseling, and they'd diagnosed her with borderline depression. She'd had a total disconnect from her surroundings, including me.
I made sure that she went to her appointments, and I attended many along with her. Serious notetaking helped me understand the causes of her depression, and how to help her. A lot of it was centered around her work at the hospital and the constant stress. Quite a bit had to do with the death of her parents, that same year. They had moved to Europe just a few months after we'd met, and two years later, just after our wedding, had perished in the infamous cruise ship disaster with the Syrian terrorists.
