It Took a Pandemic to Unlock to Story (Excerpt from ‘Dancing in the Purple Rain’ included)

It was a novel that took me many years to just get out of my head. And it wasn’t because of the inability to write, but rather I struggled to piece together the lie.

The opening scene (which you can read on my blog) was written back in 2017 (something like that). And I had a rough idea as to what I wanted the story to be. But I was stuck on the lie that my main character was being told.

Until the pandemic hit in 2020. Suddenly, the last piece of the puzzle I needed fell into place.

The COVID Vaccines Unlocked the Story

I don’t think any of us will disagree when I say that the year 2020 was a nightmare of a year. That was the year when so many of us were forced to be locked away in our homes, with nothing much to do, except bake bread, read books and binge-watch Netflix.

One would think that this would have been a heavenly time for a writer, because we were at home all the time. But for me, it was filled with distractions from the children (as they were forced into home-schooling) and writer’s block.

I couldn’t focus, thanks to the kids, and I was stuck on the story I was writing.

Thankfully, New Zealand (my home country) was able to come out of lockdowns with zero cases of COVID in the community after two months of being shuttered away. Granted our access to the rest of society was still restricted, but my daughter was able to return to school… sort-of, which meant I was able to focus.

But I was still stuck.

I knew that my main character was being conned into taking these drugs that were suppressing her abilities. But I couldn’t figure out the lie she was being told regarding the drugs. And I couldn’t figure out how she got these abilities in the first place.

Then in late 2020, they started rolling out the first lot of COVID vaccines. And in early 2021, it was announced that the type of COVID vaccine that would be made available in New Zealand (my home country) was one that was based on mRNA technologies. The rumors started to spread about how these vaccines were “rewriting our DNA” (which is not entirely accurate). And my writer’s brain had suddenly been unlocked.

The writer brain did what it does best: it asked that famous “What if…?” question.

What if these vaccines really were rewriting our DNA? And what if some “shady” geneticist wanted to force the next evolution of man? What side effects would happen if we started making changes to the human genome? And how would these “dodgy” vaccines influence the generations to come?

Those questions sent me down massive rabbit holes, one after another, researching health science, pharmacology, genetics, and genealogy. Eventually, I found myself looking at climate change, advanced telecommunications, and all the things that would happen if you thrust a story into the future by hundreds of years.

While the base story came out in a flood, it would still be two years before I had something that I was ready to share with others, but at least the story was finally fully structured.

And on that note, it’s time to share with you Chapter 2, where you can see how the pandemic played a role in how the world within the novel took shape.

Enjoy.

(Chapter 2 is 2,080 words.)

If you missed Chapter 1, you read it here.

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Chapter 2 from Dancing in the Purple Rain

There was another shot, and the gathered crowd outside turned into a mob running away from the chaos. I sped up into a light jog, moving with the crowd farther away from the coffee shop.

A police drone flew down the street, its lights flashing as it hovered over the crowds. I tilted my head down and pulled tight on my right sleeve with my gloved hand, ensuring that the RDF signal blocker was shielding my pharmachip from remote scans. I even altered my gait.

With gunshots fired, there was every probability that the drone would be scanning the crowd, hunting for anomalies. With my chip hidden, I would appear as a dark spot in their scans, something that would be flagged for later review. But as long as any identifiable features were obscured, they wouldn’t know exactly who I was. I had to stay hidden . . . at least until I got to the sector checkpoint.

I continued to jog down the street with the rest of the crowd. More drones flew overhead, whizzing toward the source of the chaos. Eventually, the crowd slowed down, many people hunching over, exhausted from the brief brush with mortality. I slowed to a walk, but didn’t stop.

Pedestrians coming from the other direction gathered in groups as they all looked to the skies. It never ceased to amaze me how a little chaos would draw out people’s curious nature.

A young child kept pushing his mother’s hand away as she tried to readjust the child’s breather mask. The child pointed to the sky, holding still long enough to give the mother a moment to ensure the child’s mask was fitted correctly.

In the plaza just outside the checkpoint, a group of protesters held up signs about all the negative impacts of the pharmachips. How they were controlling people’s thoughts. My vid-feed displayed all kinds of assessment threat data, including the elevated body temperatures of the protesters. A red haze surrounded their persons. Xs hung over their heads. The system was unable to identify the exact contagion they carried.

One of the protesters reached out to the crowd with blackened fingers, and the crowd took a wide berth. Guards filed out from the security checkpoint. It would have been nice to believe that the protesters would have been escorted to medical facilities to get treated, but that wouldn’t happen. Without the pharmachips that they protested against, proper medical treatment would be denied.

The health centers in Sector 4 could only do so much. Most of the time, medicine in the outer sectors was limited to wild herbs steeped in boiling water. Any medical facility worth a damn was located in Sector 14, and the only way to get into Sector 14 was via a sector pass connected to the pharmachips. No chip, and access through the sector checkpoints was denied. But even with a pharmachip, there was no guarantee that one could get into Sector 14. Entry into the sector was restricted to those with money or sponsorship.

I sighed. As much as I hated being a courier for the Pregutor, without my job, I wouldn’t have had money. Without my job, I wouldn’t have had sponsorship either. The Rhodon Corporation, with their white rose logo, was my sponsor.

A ding sounded in my ears, alerting me to a new message. I tapped into the empty space in front of me to open it.

››Fifty thousand credits have been deposited into your account, and a prescription for Miransine has been dispatched. It will be ready for you to pick up from your chosen pharmacy after 4:00 p.m. Payment for the prescription has already been deducted from your account.‹‹

I did the mental math. Fifty thousand credits minus rent, that thimble of coffee, and my prescription. If I was lucky, I had three hundred credits left to my name. And I had to make that last for two weeks. Definitely no coffee in my foreseeable future. Not the real stuff, anyway.

At least I wouldn’t need to worry about the meds that I needed to stave off the symptoms of White Rabbit syndrome.

I glanced at the clock in the corner of my vision and groaned. Eight hours before my script would be ready to pick up, assuming the pharmacy wasn’t backlogged, and assuming they had a supply of Miransine and didn’t have to order it in. Eight hours. Normally, that wouldn’t have been a problem, but it had been near on twenty-four hours since my last dose, and my hands were already starting to shake. In eight hours, the symptoms would be much worse. If I was lucky, the voices would be harmless.

No, I needed to find a source of the active ingredient in Miransine right away. Thankfully, there was a natural source roughly two hours away. It wasn’t as concentrated as Miransine was, but it would be enough to tide me over until I could pick up my meds from the pharmacy.

As the crowd moved to the barriers, small pedestals rose out of the ground with scanners. I approached the scanner closest to me and pulled back my right sleeve, holding my wrist to the scanner. A giant green checkmark flashed on the pedestal.

I crossed the threshold into the glass canopy structure that separated Sector 4 from its neighboring sectors. The overhead glass was streaked with dirt and filth. A purplish-brown tinge colored the lines that dribbled down the sides. In places, the purple hue was vibrant. It was further proof that the rain that fell from the sky wasn’t just water—like anyone really needed that proof. At certain times of the year, it was only the hoods that people wore that kept their skin from melting off.

Cameras were scattered throughout the facility, taking pictures of those walking through, comparing those pictures to government records. No one went through a secured facility without multiple scans—matching biometrics, measuring the gait of your walk, comparing your photo, and checking many other things too. How it all worked with the goggles and filtered masks in place was a little mystery, but they did it.

A holographic sign blinked into existence before me.

››You are now entering Sector 4 Inspection Area. Please remove your hood.‹‹

The last time I tried to proceed through a sector checkpoint with my hood still up, an electric shock went through my system. Just the thought of that pain was enough to send shivers down my spine.

I lowered my hood and glanced at the camera directly above me. If only I could figure out how to pass by those cameras like a ghost. Surely, I would get paid more for my deliveries if I had that knowledge. Then again, the Pregutor might ask me to be the one to pull the trigger, not just deliver the weapons.

A line on the ground sprang into life; a blinking series of arrows on my virtual display told me which security gate to use. Not that I needed the arrows to tell me which way to go. My sector pass granted me the privilege to use exclusive lines dedicated to diplomats and city officials. I never really understood how a courier would be worthy of carrying such an elite pass, but it was convenient. Because of my pass, I didn’t have to go through the metal detectors. Good thing too, considering sometimes the packages I carried contained guns—and bombs—and the components to make bombs.

As I bypassed the lines heading to the metal detectors, I could feel the eyes of suspicion on me. Why would a petite woman with purple hair be treated as though she was above the rest of society? Politicians and other city officials didn’t have purple hair. And the rich folk never came down to Sector 4.

A security guard came out and stood before me. “I’m sorry, but I will have to ask you to join the lines with the other patrons.”

“I have the appropriate pass to be in this line. What’s the problem?”

“No problem with your pass. The health scanner is down for maintenance.”

“I thought they did maintenance in the evenings, when no one was coming through.”

“Unfortunately, the unit dedicated for the express lines is giving everyone the big X, and it has been doing so for the last hour. We can’t seem to reconnect to the servers. Until we do, you’ll have to use the other scanners. It can’t be helped.”

I sighed and shook my head. While my sector pass gave me the privilege of bypassing the metal detectors, everyone who went through a sector checkpoint needed to go through one of the health scanners. No exceptions. It was the only way that the city officials could contain disease and stop it from spreading throughout the city.

It wasn’t a bad thing. The scanners often picked up things that in the past would have been allowed to fester. The scanner I went through two days ago pointed out a scratch behind my knee that I didn’t remember getting—a scratch that was just starting to show signs of infection. A small amount of topical ointment and it was gone. The scanner I went through on the way to Sector 4 pointed out that my audimensase levels were getting high. The system suggested that I take some Miransine to counter the effects. If only I could get to the pharmacy to pick up my prescription.

I looked at the clock display on my glasses again. Gah. Seven hours. And the shaking in my hands was getting steadily worse. And now there was a constant hum inside my head too. The only thing that would make my symptoms go away was mintonal, the active ingredient in Miransine.

I sighed in defeat. “Okay. Thank you.” So much for getting out of the sector fast. Instead, I joined the shortest line I could find, standing on the virtual dots spaced two meters apart.

As I waited for my turn in the scanner, I scrolled through the newsfeed, trying to determine if the events at the coffee shop had already been relegated to old news. There were reports about the latest flurona outbreak to ripple through Sector 2—not surprising considering that Sector 2 was the gateway into the city for those looking for a better life. And there were headlines about the latest advances in algae food production and lab-grown protein, but it still wouldn’t be enough to feed the entire population of the human race. Many would still die of starvation. But right at the bottom, I found what I was looking for.

››Two dead at coffee shop in Sector 4. Pharmachip protesters blamed. The identity of the dead still to be confirmed.‹‹

So that was how the Pregutor was going to play it. It made sense, given everything I had seen. The faulty scanner would have possibly granted entry to the protester. And there were protesters outside the checkpoint saying that the pharmachip was controlling minds. The best way to take down a movement was to fuel hatred and suspicion against that movement. And no one would be looking for a courier in possession of an elite sector pass.

I finally stepped onto the sensor pad of the health scanner and waited. Clear doors closed me into the unit, giving me a false sense of privacy as the unit scanned for any infection and told me the results. Sector border guards would only be informed if I carried some disease that was a danger to others. Thankfully, my audimentia, aka White Rabbit syndrome, was genetic. I could only pass that on to my children, assuming I ever had children.

The soft hum of the machine filled the tiny space.

One, one thousand. Two, one thousand. Three, one thousand.

The scanner took a full body scan, measuring localized body temperature, searching for hot spots and measuring my pulse rate and blood flow. It connected into the tech of my breather, measuring for any ketosis or elevated carbon dioxide respiration. And it connected to my pharmachip, which had an on-board testing system to keep a close monitor of my blood sugars. These scanners were meant to catch anyone who might be presenting symptoms of any number of diseases.

A green checkmark flashed in front of me, and the doors opened, allowing me to proceed to the transport tubes.

Six seconds from the start of the scan cycle to the end. A new record.

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Dancing in the Purple Rain is now available from your favorite retailer.