The Pollinators
The world can end in so many ways.
Pathogens locked up in Arctic permafrost for millennia are slowly waking up – an army of single-celled Rip Van Winkles. As the north continues to warm and thaw, zombie bacteria and previously unknown viruses will be released into the world like the contents of some terrifying new Pandora’s box. The illnesses would spread quickly, thanks to intercontinental travel. Not everyone on earth would die, of course, but civilization would collapse like dominoes. Cities would be abandoned. Life, as we know it, would end. Gamma ray bursts from the sun are my greatest hope for us, really. It would be blessedly quick. Not entirely clean, of course, but nothing that annihilates all sentient life on a planet ever could be. If you really think about it,
