Essential

Thinning. That’s all I could think as I looked at myself in the mirror. My cheek bones protruded through my face, threatening to pierce through my cheek and split my face open. It was like my face was a bag that had been vacuum sealed. This thought gave me an idea. I sealed my lips together and exhaled into my month, attempting to mimic a puffer fish. The result was disturbing. Cheek bones still protruded. The only difference is that there were tiny little bubbles in the skin.

I lifted up my shirt, knowing what I would find, but still curious to see it for myself. Another vacuum sealed skin bag. My ribs were a xylophone and my chest wasn’t really a chest at all. It was flat bone with a very slight hint of tendons stretching underneath the skin. I thought I saw little cuts or abrasions in the tendons, like a crusty old rubber band on its last stretch. I let the shirt drape over my torso, a tent over the tent poles.

The doctor said that I lacked essential nutrients. No shit. Specifically, he said… well I don’t remember the specifics. Something about collagen and vitamin b12. Some amino acids that ended in “ine” or “ide.” It didn’t matter. It’s like I would get those nutrients. I would never get a prescription, a proper diet, or a healthy atmosphere to live in.

The experiments started almost a decade before I was recruited for the program. There was a breakthrough in quantum physics and scientists thought they could make people invisible. I’m not a scientist so I don’t know what the breakthrough was or what the connection was to invisibility. But I will tell you another set of scientists thought invisibility would be the perfect defense against climate change. The argument was simple, your body won’t heat up nearly as much if the sun’s rays go right through it. The kicker, the thing that got both sides on board, was that invisibility had obvious benefits for the military. The cherry on top was that all the kids and influencers were chasing it too. Everyone wanted to be the first. I wasn’t sure how an influencer would profit from videos on social media if they could not be seen. Maybe they would do pranks or something.

It was all voluntary and really exciting at first. Exciting for those who gave a fuck. Me, I was just trying to make a living. I worked at a plastics recycling plant outside of Dayton. We didn’t really recycle the stuff, we just cleaned and sorted it so that the plant could try to sell it to someone who could actually recycle it. All I wanted to do was make enough money to pay my damn child support. I didn’t give a fuck about the invisibility race.

But it really was a race. China and Russia and Europe got in on it. It was the new space race. Tons of money poured into healthcare and biogenetics and physics and other smart people bullshit. After almost a decade, nobody really got there.

A lot also happened in that decade. There was the “nuclear incident” where super powers accidentally detonated two bombs and somehow, someone talked the world out of going to complete war over it. Besides, the world had other issues. The heating planet made it harder to grow food, inflation increased, and we had a…let’s just say ‘more authoritative government’ gain power.

Once the joy of the invisibility race evaporated, the US was still set on winning, even if by more grim means. So that’s where I come in. I’m volunteer 4389b43k. That means I was pulled from my home one day, brought to this facility, and told I was volunteering in a research study. That was almost two years ago. I don’t sleep or eat much here. I also don’t get many essential nutrients. I don’t think I am anywhere close to becoming invisible. But I certainly am disappearing.