/Author's Note\

This is my second fiction on RoyalRoad, it is a Post-Apocalyptic Sci-Fi story.

My first fiction, World Advancement, is a more Fantasy based Sci-Fi.

Please rate my fiction and comment any feedback you have, I am always looking to improve my stories.

Anyway, Enjoy the chapter.

-PRESENT DAY, YEAR: 2532-

A small armored vehicle sped down a deserted highway going about a hundred miles per hour. Matt, the driver, reassured himself that the vehicle was safe. Although the armor wasn’t that thick, at the speed he was going anything that could catch up wouldn’t be strong enough to get inside.

At the speed he was going it would only be a few more minutes until the highway left the confines of the pine filled mountain pass and he would be able to see his destination.

Once he left the pass he parked the vehicle at the overlook and got out.

Eyeing his surroundings carefully Matt listened and smelled for any nearby animals. Finding none he relaxed.

Yes, he smelled for them.

This is because Matt is a 15 percenter, someone whose genes are 15 percent non-human.

Matt walked from the armored vehicle to the edge of the overlook and looked through the valley to find his destination.

He spotted it, a city entirely devoid of life. There were vehicles haphazardly strewn about the roads and hints of the life that used to dwell there.

Oddly enough, even though, without a doubt, the city was completely deserted, the lights were still on.

It appeared as though the residents all decided to step out for a bit and forgot to turn the lights off.

This city was once named Denver Colorado and it, along with Matt, and all other life on earth were changed forever by the events of 20 years ago.

The year 2512 marked the deadliest year in human history, no in the history of life on earth.

Within the next few years 90 percent of the human population was wiped out and 50 percent of animal life.

However this was no sudden event, no natural disaster.

This apocalypse was artificial, created through the hubris of the human race.

The year 2512 was merely a tipping point where the events that had transpired over the course of the last half century all lined up like dominoes and came crashing down.

The end of the world began on the greatest day in human history, February 17th 2465.

-Nevada, February 17th 2465-

The top secret facility was located in the middle of the Nevada desert.

Many miles away from the nearest city or town it is the former location of Area-51.

What lies there now is a state of art scientific facility, miles in diameter.

Many of the greatest scientists, engineers, and the very best from other fields of study have gathered to bring the greatest invention in human history to fruition.

These experts have gathered from across the globe, leaving behind their families, giving away their privacy, and secluding themselves from the rest of the world.

The Helios Project.

The goal of the Helios Project is to create the first nuclear fusion reactor that had an output many times greater than the energy required to start the reaction.

In other words, the project’s goal was to create an artificial star and harness its power.

After forty years of preparation the reactor was finally complete.

Today, the 17th of February, was the day the star would be brought to life.

The tension and anticipation filled the air as the lab members buzzed around the facility doing last minute checks on all the systems.

Because this is extremely dangerous the project had advanced to the point where the projected success rate is 99.99% so as to prevent any dangerous failures.

Even if something were to fail there were many systems in place to stop the activation within nanoseconds.

However everyone there knew that it wouldn’t be over until the fat lady sings so to speak.

The preparations were completed and all members got to their posts.

The countdown began.

Armrests were gripped.

Eyes stared unblinking at the monitors.

Breaths were held as each system booted up and cleared.

As the final activation began every person in the facility waited with one thought on their minds.

“Please let this work.”

Suddenly a loud automated voice rang out over the system speakers.

“ACTIVATION SUCCESSFUL. REACTOR OUTPUT STABILIZED.”

The facility broke out in loud cries of victory.

The usually business minded employees were shouting and hugging each other, some with tears of joy running down their faces.

The project lead yelled over the loudspeaker.

“The project is a success! We have 3 billion percent output to input ratio! This reactor will replace every power station in the United States! Ladies and Gentleman, you have just saved the world!”

-United States, 2465-

Within a week the first Helios Reactor was successfully connected into the nation’s power grid.

All other power stations were shut down and overnight the level of carbon emissions from the US plummeted.

The citizens were informed by the president in a passionate speech.

It was revealed that from then on there would no longer be any electric bills in the whole country due to the great cost to output ratio of the new reactor, instead the reactor would pay for itself through selling the excess energy to other countries.

Within a few years US citizens had all switched to all electric vehicles because electricity was free.

The US quickly became more and more affluent.

But nobody realized the negative aspect of this world changing invention.

Before the Helios reactor the world was still mostly reliant on fossil fuels.

When the US broke away from fossil fuel use it caused the oil producing countries to loose around 30 percent of its customer base.

These countries were forced to make a choice either drastically raise the price of oil or their economy would crash.

A decision like that was no decision at all so the oil producing countries ended up raising the price of oil by a factor of 10.

For the moment this kept those countries afloat but this simply pushed the economic troubles onto someone else.

The oil consuming countries were hit hard by this sudden change.

Poverty rates spiked, starvation was rampant.

The situation escalated and soon enough it descended into war.

World War 3, Eurasia and Africa descended into chaos.

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

It was a quick and desperate war.

Time was running out for the people of the oil consuming countries.

They declared war on the producing countries, demanding that they lower the price of oil.

As the war raged on things only began to get worse.

Seeing this the United States decided to build reactors to assist the failing countries

In exchange for the energy from the reactors various treaties would have to be formed among the receiving parties.

The biggest of these were the demilitarization of all accepting countries and the adoption of the US dollar as the main currency so the economies of the countries could be revitalized.

Additionally the land the reactors would be built on would be ceded to the United States to prevent the leakage of Reactor Technology.

3 countries seized the opportunity to host a reactor because they knew it would benefit them greatly despite having to give up their sovereignty.

And so England, Japan, and South Africa all became states of the United States.

As many of their citizens put it, “Who cares if we are a country as long as we are rich?”

With this the United Stated allied itself with 90 percent of the world, global emissions almost disappeared, world peace was almost achieved, and the poverty rate fell drastically.

Eventually, outnumbered and with the demand for oil almost non-existent the oil countries surrendered and entered into the alliance.

The age of fossil fuels and inter-country wars was over.

With the whole world united in alliance it was decided that it was time for humanity to undo the damage they had caused to the planet.

By the year 2500 it had been decided that the best way to remove the harmful human created substances was to genetically engineer organisms that could break down those substances.

However, there was a problem.

It was determined that with traditional genetic engineering it would take far too long to create these organisms.

That’s when one team made a breakthrough.

They realized that nature already had traits spread among different species that, when put together, would perform the desired function.

However it was impossible to breed these different species together.

So they created a way to take traits from one organism and pass them to another.

They created a designer virus that would take genes from one organism and insert them into the offspring of another.

They called it transferase 122-b.

This genetic manipulation tool was manually injected into any organisms that they were trying to modify.

They made sure to create it so it had no ordinary way of transmission.

However they missed something.

One subject that was tested on had another dormant virus that had the ability to transmit through both air, and water.

When the transferase absorbed the subject’s genes it also absorbed the part of the dormant virus that allowed it to transmit.

It quickly infected the research team and began to spread from them.

This virus would come to be known as the Pandora Virus.

Pandora Virus has two stages.

Stage One:

1. The virus enters donor host’s cells and absorbs a random amount of DNA.

2. The virus transmits to secondary host.

3. When the virus enters the gametes (sex cells) of the second host it overwrites the DNA with the absorbed DNA. In all other cells it drops the absorbed DNA and repeats steps 1 and 2.

4. Offspring of secondary host is genetically altered and secondary host transmits altered virus.

The Pandora Virus spread quickly between humans because of the large population and number of interactions.

The Pandora Virus went unnoticed for a couple years because most of the primary hosts were humans and it did not affect the offspring too much.

However more and more animals became primary hosts and human children with unusual traits began popping up more and more often.

Finally humanity noticed this virus in the year 2512.

But it was too late.

A vaccine was easily developed because of the origin of the virus but to their dismay 99% of humans were already infected with the virus and only the uninfected would be affected by the vaccine.

Many of the changed children were unable to survive the absorbed DNA and many mothers died in childbirth.

Worse, altered animals began popping up all over the place and hunting humans.

This was the Apocalypse of Hubris. This was The Pandora Virus.

-Year 2532, Formerly Denver Colorado, Matt’s POV-

My name is Matt Eriksson.

My mother was an infected, a person with the Pandora Virus.

I am 85 percent human, and 15 percent wolf.

I was fortunate as the DNA I absorbed was all harmless or even beneficial.

My sense of smell, hearing, and sight were all enhanced.

Instead of human ears I have wolf ears.

Yes, pretty much like in anime.

My hair is fur-like and extends down my back.

I also have enlarged canines and while I am not fully a carnivore I have a high preference for meat.

Physically I am fairly lean in build and I can put on muscles relatively fast.

I am unable to store very much body fat and as such I am prone to starvation unless I have a steady intake of food.

That is why I am called a 15 percenter.

After the Apocalypse it was considered safer the less foreign DNA a person had.

With a few exceptions any human that had 20 percent or more foreign DNA would become dominated by their nonhuman side.

Fear and reasoning soon transformed into discrimination and oppression.

Society reformed with the people with the most genetic purity at the top.

The Immunes, those unable to get the Pandora virus, were on top.

All those born with foreign DNA, or the Defiled as the Immunes call them, were under their rule and structured in ranks according to decreasing genetic purity.

Any child born with 20% or more foreign DNA was killed.

This brings me to why I am in the ruins of Denver today.

As a 15 percenter I have been assigned to be a scavenger.

I am to collect electronics from the empty city and then to disconnect the main power cable.

“It’s time to go.” I mumble to myself.

I get in my armored vehicle and speed away towards the silent city.

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-----------World Advancement-----------

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