But It Was The New Very Berry Flavor. Surely That Works Better.

The purps knew exactly what they were doing. The lighting in the video was dark and foreboding, yet the two days worth of facial stubble on the face of the hostage came through just as clearly as the desperation contained behind his fearful eyes.

"I am a fraud, and I'm sorry it ever came to this," the voice softly cracked into the camera. "I just want to say I miss my wife and family very much, and I hope you listen to the requests of my captors"

The knife pressed against his throat as the screen went dark.

A week ago it had all seemed so easy. A week ago he was making a routine presentation to another health department strapped for cash and feeling overwhelmed and overstressed. He knew their budget had been cut. He knew health departments did not like the expense of fighting off infections. A full-scale deployment of the immune system was not cheap. And he knew most health departments were run by the brain cells that were not exactly the sharpest knives in the drawer.

He was Airborne,™ and he had made a pretty good living off people who can't understand the words "there is no cure for the common cold"

This time, however, he was up against Pneumococcal pneumonia.

He knew something was wrong as soon as he merged into the bloodstream. His plan was to check into the hotel and lay low for a week, then emerge and claim all credit and a fat paycheck when the cold had resolved itself, the way it always does. The blood was warm though. Too warm. Broken white blood cells were lying in the median, some crying, some too exhausted to move, some on the verge of death. "The doxycycline......oh God....the doxycycline is here....we might have a chance" muttered the shell-shocked white blood cell lieutenant. Airborne had no idea what he was talking about and slowly drove past. He heard the unique laughter that marks the mentally broken as he pulled away, but he knew it was too late to turn back.

That night 5 members of the streptococcus pneumoniae militia broke into his hotel room, and they did terrible things to Airborne. They found orifices he had no idea were there. They created new orifices. They gave him pain like he never experienced in his wildest nightmares. They made him say it as they chopped off one of his fingers:

The Airborne health formula helps to support your immune system through its blend of vitamins and minerals. Airborne’s unique combination of vitamins, nutrients and proprietary blend of herbal extracts all work together to create the formula people swear by.

They laughed and made him say it again and chugged more tequila. Then they cut off another one of his fingers and made the video where he begged for his life.

Doxycycline found what was left of Airborne's corpse as soon as he emerged through the duodenum. He winced, but did not weep. In the end, no one wept for Airborne. The wife he claimed to miss so much spent the life insurance settlement on breast enhancement surgery, and Airborne was buried in an unmarked grave, along with the hopes of a million or so suckers, who thought there was a cure for the common cold.