Tales of Horror: The unseen story of HIV's Invasion

My name is HIV Type 2, Code number 419, but you can call me H. I am here for this interview with neuron 54 to tell him my story, nay, our story. How we came into this land and took over. We are not evil; we are simply the victors in this story. I will tell you our origin the same way it was told to me. This is our truth, and soon it will become your truth too.

It all started with the twin HIV RNA and their protectors: the capsid and the gp-120. Gp-120 was responsible for finding a suitable land for them to replicate and build their army: the land of the CD-4s. You might know them as the white blood cells. Capsid’s job was to ensure they survived until this land was found. Once this land was found, the twins would then use their powers, each one possessing the RIP power. The power to replicate without the disgusting need for another. See, that’s what makes you all so weak: your need to function as a collective group. Even you neurons, but I digress.

Once in the CD-4 land, they began their mission to infiltrate and replicate. First, they used the power of R, Reverse Transcriptase, to change their form from RNA to DNA. They then used the power of I, Integrase, to join your ranks. Your foolish lymphocytes did not even notice. From then on, it was all a matter of waiting, as your cells did their work in synthesizing proteins they did not even realize they had begun to make viral proteins. What about P, you ask? That power is quite special, you see. The power of P, Protease, splits the new viral proteins and packages them into new HIV viruses. I, myself, am a child of the original twins, not one of their children’s children.

Soon that land of CD-4 was completely overrun. The children were then asked to find other lands. From then on, it was smooth sailing: infiltrate, replicate, expand, and repeat. Well, there was that one time a lymphocyte tried to summon more lymphocytes to stop our army with a power called MHC-I or something. Well, who cares? We created a protein to mask that signal and contain that.

How many did we kill? Well, if you are talking about lymphocytes only, after we gained a solid footing, we killed about 1-2 billion of them a day. At this point, we could recruit others to our cause, such as Epstein Barr, a real nasty fella, some yeast, some fungi, and even other bacteria. Is this interview over? It was not an interview. Oh yeah, I came here to kill you and started monologuing, didn’t I? Well, I am excited after all; it is about to be born, the peak of our evolution. After we started expanding and took over structures such as the skin, lungs, and even the liver, I must say I was disappointed to see such a sorry state the hepatocytes were in. I would have liked to fight them at their full strength. Look at me digressing again. We were talking about our evolution. It does not matter though; you will be dead.

H went away after killing neuron 54 to the site of HIV evolution. Well, it was not exactly an evolution; it was just the state of the world they lived in due to their presence. The area was filled with all sorts of organisms that had invaded the human body due to the absence of CD-4’s land of defense. This is the ground zero for AIDS.

In the actual world, Mister Wanker was in a Catholic church confessing his sins to the priest upon receiving his diagnosis of HIV from his doctor. He confessed to his drinking and his sexual promiscuity. He confessed that when he had started feeling sick he had patronized the Iya Agba at the T junction and only when he had not gotten better had he gone to the hospital. He took solace in the fact that he had never smoked before, a vain act the priest thought. They both assumed it was one of his many sexual partners that had transmitted the deadly virus to him. They would never know that he got the virus from a barbershop.

Olajide Olamide