A Prodigy

"Why are you behaving like a teenager who just saw her crush?" 2025 demanded the moment Grace climbed into her car.

Grace's hands stilled on their way to secure her seatbelt and she stared at her reflection in the rearview mirror. What she saw there didn't sit right with her at all. Her cheeks were flushed, her eyes looked wild, and her expression was that of someone who just got caught red-handed.

She quickly shook her head, trying to clear her thoughts. "What nonsense are you spouting?" She threw at 2025 in a futile attempt, but soon realized that it had already seen through her.

"Don't even try to lie. The way you behaved in that examination room was so embarrassing. I thought you met him briefly in your last life. Was that really enough for you to fall for him?" 2025 asked, actually sounding curious.

"I..." Grace wanted to deny, but she stopped when she failed to find an excuse for her reaction toward Dr. Kian. She closed her eyes and let out a deep sigh, trying hard to calm herself down.

When she opened her eyes moments later, she directed a question toward 2025. "Isn't he a neurosurgeon? How come he's in the oncology department today?" The only reason she asked the questions was because she expected 2025 to know the answer and she was soon proved right.

"He's indeed a neurosurgeon. But he has double degrees in medicine, the other one being breast oncology. He started pursuing the second degree when he was doing his residency in neurosurgery. Now, he's the only doctor in the country with double degrees in two greatest medical fields."

Grace was left stunned by what she learned from 2025 about Dr. Kian. The only words that left her mouth moments later were - "Is that even possible? How can someone pursue both neurosurgery and oncology at the same time? Is he even human?"

"He's a prodigy." 2025 answered in a tone that stated clearly just how much it worshiped Dr. Kian. "You should have seen it coming ever since you learnt that he was the only person in the country who succeeded in merging the system and the magical realm of your jade bracelet."

That's right. She should have known that he was no ordinary person since he could achieve the impossible. Just as she was digesting everything, another question struck her.

"Wait! He's a doctor. How... how did he even get on the jade bracelet's project let alone succeeding in completing the project? A doctor working on a technical project - doesn't make any sense to me."

2025's voice was filled with admiration as it cleared her confusion. "He had computer science as a second degree during his undergraduate. Though he didn't pursue it after that, he's still very good in it. The Infinte Programme wasn't the only one where he worked using his computer science knowledge. He's been involved in several such projects over the years."

The more Grace listened, the less she wanted to believe. In the end, she just shook her head and let out a deep sigh.

"Don't you think he's amazing?" 2025 demanded when it noticed her long silence.

"No. I don't." Grace replied as she prepared to start the car and head away from that hospital and Dr. Kian. But at that very moment, her phone started buzzing with an incoming call.

Not recognizing the number or the caller ID, she picked up the call and spoke, "Hello?"

[Hello, Ms. Blackwood. I'm speaking from Outpatient Hospital. We wanted to inform you that you forgot your examination report here when you left the Hospital a while ago.]

A woman, probabaly a nurse, spoke politely from the other end of the call.

"Oh... I... Can I send someone to pick up the report later?" Grace asked as she didn't want to step into that hospital again.

There was silence for a few seconds before the woman asked - [Have you already left the hospital grounds? If not, someone from the hospital can take the reports to you right now so you will not need to make another visit to pick them up.]

Grace hesitated for a second before she decided to just get the report and leave quickly. "I'm in the parking lot in front of the hospital. I will wait here."

[Alright. You will need to wait for a few minutes.]

Ending the call, Grace removed her seatbelt and climbed out of the car. The sun was slowly moving west, ready to end the day within next two hours. The sky was clear, the clearest she had seen in a long while.

When the end of the world came, it didn't happen within a day. Instead, it started slowly before completely taking over. Currently, it was the beautiful beginning of autumn, but soon unexpected rain would arrive to ruin everything.

There would be heavy rainfall, storms, floods and hurricanes. Then winter would arrive to cover the entire world in snow, something that never happened before.

There would be mega earthquakes, supervolcano eruptions, tsunamis, solar flare, ice age, global pandemic, and then... finally the worst would come as a virus would start turning humans into zombies and demonic beasts would appear on earth out of nowhere.

Grace let out a sigh as she took in the beauty of nature around her. Very soon, all of this would be gone. She took a look at the timer set in the system.

99 Days, 7 hours, and 43 minutes.

From what she could recall, the first rainfall wouldn't happen until two more weeks. That was the most time she had to make quick preparations because hoarding supplies would get harder once the government would realize that the weather was changing for the worst.

She was still lost in her thoughts when she heard a very familiar voice calling her name from behind.

"Ms. Blackwood, your report."

She immediately turned around and came face-to-face with the last person she wanted to talk to at that moment.

"Why are you here?"