It is always amazing that something so little as a bacteria could cause so large a change. Most SciFi novels write about a superbioengineered bug that changes humanity into something different.

But when I think of superbugs, I think of the Black Plague and HG Wells’ War of the World. 

An instrument of destruction and death.

 We know that on Earth a simple cold wiped out indigenous peoples in the Americas. That after the Vikings landed the explosure to foreign bacteria killed large swaths of tribes, and that the US government infected blankets with disease to eliminate the native population.

And yet, disease creates change as well.

The Black Plague changed the conditions of many living in serfdom in the Middle Ages. Guess we treat those scarce things better than in abundance. 

To change things up, I added technology to the mix and created my cyborgs. They could go into infected areas while a vaccine was being developed. Or a vaccine could be abandoned in favor of a better, more durable class of workers.  After all, why safe people when you could get more labor for your investment?

Of course, I had an ulterior motive for the Surlat Plague. A familiar trope in SciFi is cross breeding and slave labor, but I wanted to go the extra mile. I wanted humans to be valued as nothing more than lab rats. We are very plentiful.

Until next time