The Disease
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I first noticed the disease infecting a clerk at Taco Bell.
As I approached the counter, the clerk gave me a look of bored
contempt while monotonously intoning, 'Can I help you?'. I said,
Bell beefer, medium drink, to go'.  'Is that for here or to go?' the
clerk said. 'Uh, to go', I said, dumbfounded by the unnecessary
echo. The clerk slowly packed my order as if sleepwalking, and had
to re-check the register to see what size drink I ordered.

Symptoms of the disease include short attention span, short-term
memory cache of one or zero items, irritable or apathetic attitude,
and lack of attention to detail (spelling errors, grammatical errors,
inability to focus on a task or conversation, inability to complete
a task without making errors, interrupting others, running red
lights, etc.)

I hypothesize that it is a virus mimicing an amino acid that
bonds to the end sites of synapse-firing paths in the brain
and central nervous system. When the synapse fires, there is no
end site available, therefore no connection can be made. Hence the
automaton-like (though inefficient) interaction with others and
physically slow, zombie-like movements.

More research should bear this out or set me on the correct path to
a new theory. Though I don't have much time. More and more people
seem to be infected every day, even my colleagues. More and more
test tubes being mislabeled and, upon the mistake being discovered,
the shoulders being shrugged, as if to say 'oh, well'.

I returned the following week to Taco Hell and ordered a chow-wow-wa,
no ground beef, and medium drink. When the chow came up, it was,
of course, not meatless. The clerk sighed heavily and said, 'I
must've forgot to press the button. I'll re-send it." This time, I
watched him press the button and watched my order appear 'meatless'
on the computer screen in the kitchen.

However, the second chow also had meat on it. Clearly, I was
irritating the clerk, even though it was their screw-up, not mine.
But he checked with the girl who made it and she said blankly,
'I must have missed the 'meatless' part.' The clerk asked me if
I was a vegetarian.  I replied, 'No, it's just that your meat is
so nasty.' The girl remade the chow, yet again, and this time it
was acceptable.

I felt regret that the disease had spread in so short a time from
the clerk to the girl, and I knew I had to act fast.  That night,
I returned, parking my car out of camera range and walked to the
employee entrance. I was careful to keep my face covered and to
wear generic clothing. I shot them both in the heart, taking their
heads back to my lab for analysis.

Unfortunately, before I could corroborate my theory, you officers
were at my door. Seems that I dropped my wallet at the employee
entrance. Sadly, I've become infected, too.. too late.