Experimental Serum Omicron

We cannot wait for years of studies and tests! I need to have this shit ready ASAP! That rich motherfucker has one foot in a gold-framed grave already!

— Dr. Christos Brightlight

At some point during the 2030s to 2040s, the most wealthy people of planet earth became convinced they were rich enough to somehow bribe death. And as there's always some scientist horny for a sufficiently large bag of money offered, research into becoming immortal was greatly intensified soon enough.

As there are several, though rather "simple" creatures on this god-forsaken planet which can live forever, there was enough biological matter to slice up and look through. The scientists had a place to start. And with all that money up their rear ends, they did not have to waste any time applying for grants. They quickly found ways to combine genes of the simple immortal creatures and those of slightly less simple and mortal creatures. Money sure helps with hiding immoral research, as it turned out.

Are you even listening to yourself? This stuff is turning the lab rats' blood into bright blue, pink or yellow! Don't you think the effects are somewhat, like, unexpected?

— The desperate voice of reason

Patient Zero

Of course Dr. Brightlight decided to test the serum on himself to quicken the process. The first results were not even bad: His cells did stop aging, which was what he had hoped for. There was even a significant acceleration in the healing capabilities of his body.

But as they say, hubris comes back to mess you up (or something) and at some point, side effects started showing. After very scientifically checking the proper functionality of the heart rate monitor, an unusually confused colleague of Dr. Brightlight stated that the Doctor's heart had stopped beating entirely. This was considered strange, as he still appeared quite alive and aware of his surroundings. The continuing genetic alteration stopped soon after that, though, giving Brightlight just one more new trait: a very stereotypical thirst for blood.

That's not too much of a problem, right? I mean, blood bags are a thing...

— Dr. Brightlight, after cutting up a coworker to feed

The neoning

What really kicked off the spiral downward to the biter situation was a major hiccup in handling the virus used to manipulate the patients' genome. When the thirst-for-blood sideffect appeared unusually quickly in one of the rich patients the virus was injected into, a junior researcher was bitten. Being aware of the rumours about other non-clients mysteriously disappearing from the lab afterwards, the young woman kept the incident to herself. She managed to hide the symptoms by stealing some blood bags and using makeup. This obiously only went well for a while before other people got infected. From there, the situation quickly got out of hand with the virus spreading exponentially.

Yeah, "Eat the rich!" doesn't sound all that bad in hindsight, does it?

— That same voice of reason, some years later