I watch them, you know. I always have. Ever since Adam ate that damn apple. I mean, come on! That apple was The seed. And he ate it, our seed! And now all because he could not control his needs, I've got to watch them. All of them. And they are boring, so very boring.
But I get to be the fated Goddess who must be party to the comings and goings of these creatures. Me, the Goddess of Time! It's not my fault that he ate the apple when I wasn't looking.
'Do you still hold this much anger Taimi? After so many years?'
'Masina!', she screamed, 'Oh my god, you need to give a girl a warning.' She took a deep, exaggerated breath and held her hands over her heart.
'Don't be such a drama queen Taimi! You must have been expecting me. '
'What, for the prophecy? You cannot be serious. I don't think that's going to come true Masina. Time has moved past the point when it was meant to happen. And look, they still go on as normal. Look at them down there. Not really achieving much are they?'
'The part of the prophecy which said that a human would eat our seed came true!' Masina spat the words at Taimi.
'You haven't been watching closely enough,' Masina continued. 'It has begun. And there are some down there who know but are not telling their public.'
'What do you mean "it has begun"? What has begun? Wait, the virus?'. Taimi felt a trickle of fear crawl down her spine.
Masina sighed and shook his head at Taimi. For someone who was meant to look after time she wasn't very good at it. 'Yes Taimi. The Virus. From the apple. The one you were supposed to be watching. The one you let a human eat.'
"I didn't let him eat it. I looked away for a second. And that was all he needed apparently. Really! He was greedy."
'No matter how you see it, you were responsible for that seed and you lost it. And now, we all need to prepare for the extinction of the human race to happen a lot sooner than it was meant to.'
'But I haven't seen any signs of it,' Taimi proclaimed.
'It's there. Some humans have already died from it. But the general public does not know about it yet. The leaders are keeping it hidden from general knowledge. They aren't even telling the families of the dead the real cause that their loved ones are no longer alive.'
'Really! Well, I am impressed. I did not know they had it in them you know. Secrets, conspiracies. They've always been quite boring and unexciting to watch. I mean, they did have those wars but...'
'Taimi!' Masina's voice exploded and Taimi stopped talking. She looked at his face and saw the anger in the aging lines around the corners of his eyes. For a moment she was overcome by guilt. And sadness. She bowed her head slightly.
Masina, speaking with unwanted empathy, continued. 'It's bad you know. The prophecy stated that when a human ate our seed, instead of becoming the next leap in our evolution, as it was meant to, it would germinate in the DNA of Adam's bloodline for millennia and eventually, in the year 2020, it would make itself known as a virus which would slow humanity down for a while. And, actually that would have worked in our favour, given us enough time to find another seed. But this is not how it has happened.'
Taimi shot a strained glance at Masina. 'What? How has it happened then?'
'Well, my dear Taimi. It was not only Adam who ate from that apple. He threw the core, the strongest part of the apple, away and it rolled down into a rats' nest. And the rats ate it. And for all these millennia, that is where the virus has been germinating. In the tiny bodies of rats. And instead of following one bloodline, it followed many and has grown into one conscious entity. It has deliberately inhabited the humans.'
'But how?' Taimi asked.
'A rat bit one of them. And that was all that the entity needed. That one human continued with her life. Visiting friends and family, going to work, eating at restaurants. So, even with their boring lives, as you say, this virus has managed to take hold.'
'But if they go extinct too soon, then we will die.' Taimi felt a shiver roll up and down her spine as she said this.
Masina nodded. He bent towards her and gave her a kiss on her forehead. And vanished. And with that action Taimi knew it was final. She would not see him again. It was her punishment to be witness to the pain and hopelessness the humans were about to face.
She continued to watch her humans as they fought their final war. The leaders relented and eventually let their people know that they were fighting an invisible enemy. It did not take long, almost 80 years. The virus grew in strength and then faded as they fought it, but it always returned, stronger than ever. It came in waves and brought with it each time renewed fear, death and hopelessness.
And with each wave, she watched the human race dwindle down to the last few humans. There came a time when all she could see was blackness, death and destruction. The putrid odour of decay permeated the air.
As the last of them lay on their death beds, no one left to take care of them, she scooped them up and cradled them in her arms.
'I'm sorry,' she whispered and laid the last dying human down to face his fate.
