by Greig Beck
The cat groaned and licked itself, its mouth working overtime to expel the copious amounts of hair sticking to its rasp-like tongue. It stopped and seemed to rest, its golden eyes staring up at her. Maddie took this as a sign of assent and got to her feet, placing the cat on the ground, where it lay like a sagging balloon.
“Well, don’t you go away, Miss Loo-loo. I’ll be right back.”
Maddie knew where her old baby bath was, and also her berry shampoo – it’d be perfect. She maneuvered her six-year-old body through the disheveled house, scratching at her own itches as she went. Daddy went out a lot, and Mommy didn’t get out of bed much anymore. She took sleepy tablets all the time – because she hated the itch, she said.
Maddie scratched again, turning to speak over her shoulder. “And I think you’ve given me fleas now as well.” Maddie went into the garage and looked under the bench – the bath was still there, with a few of Daddy’s tools in it – she could take them out if she was careful. Reaching forward, her arm tingled, and she noticed small round lumps on the skin. She pulled her arm back and stood up, squinting down at the fingertip-sized blisters. She pressed gently against one; it didn’t hurt. She pressed again, a little harder. It burst, and then lay flat against her skin. Nothing icky came out, so she ignored it.
Probably Baloo’s fleas – she should have a bath as well. Maybe they both could have one together. She liked baths, and cats liked water too, didn’t they? She wondered where Daddy was, and tried to remember exactly when it was that he went out. She was sure he’d gone out looking for food, but it felt like a long time ago now.
She reached under the bench for the baby bath – first things first, she thought.
*****
Dr. Francis “Hew” Hewson paced in the small laboratory. He’d been wearing the sealed suit for so long, the high-density polyethylene material was chafing his skin raw. The inner lining of his nose was scabbing and his lips were chapped and split from the dry air that circulated within the self-contained mobile unit.
Hew licked his lips as his stomach grumbled. He was learning to go hours without food and water. The time it took, having to go through the double decon-chambers – first the air blast, followed by chemical misting, and then the ultraviolets – before exiting, only to then have to worm his way out of the rear flap of the heavy suit, made the few sips of fluid through a long straw far from worth it. The amount of time lost was enough to make him swallow down his hunger with a scratchy, dry throat. He needed answers, fast, so he needed to work.
He went to the computer and started typing up his latest results. Thankfully, the board had given up pressuring him for answers, preferring to simply log in and check the notes that he posted every three to six hours. Realistically, there was nothing to report beyond what they already knew. Harsh insecticides and chemical baths worked. Ultraviolet light worked. Many more chemical compounds also killed sarcoptes scabiei primus … and DDT worked best of all for a quick takedown.
But the real problem was the same one that always manifested when treating viruses. Killing a virus was easy … that is, when they were free range. However, for the most part, viruses tended to hide inside cell walls, where they did the most damage to their host. To kill them there, you had to kill the cell itself – not ideal for the human body.
The same issue arose when attempting to treat an infestation of the mite. The little monster was a burrower, and no matter how effective the external treatments, it needed to be applied directly to the skin. So far, the best-case scenario for individuals who were freed of both the living mites and their eggs was nausea, skin rashes, and respiratory problems. The short-term worst-case scenario was the risk of cancers developing. The long-term, absolute worst case, was that chemical derivates turned out to be significant mutagens, and destabilized human DNA for generations. What was the point of living today if it meant you rendered the population infertile, or worse, gave them a ninety percent chance of severe birth defects for the next hundred years?
Hew snorted. The greener politicians had stopped talking about the debilitating effects to the water table, or DDT residues turning up in the fatty deposits of whales. Any treatment was expected to be a potential hammer-blow to the environment, but it was funny how pragmatism won out when the life in danger turned out to be their own.
Hew stood back and folded his arms within the bulky suit. He looked at the image of scabiei primus magnified on the computer screen. It was every horror writer’s dream – or nightmare. A bulbous body with a chitenous coat and eight powerful legs, six of which ended in curved hooks, perfect for clinging to both hair and skin. The two legs near the head were smaller and sharper, looking like a combination of machete and chainsaw, used primarily for opening and then burrowing beneath the epidermal layers.
But it was the thing’s small head that was truly repulsive. Tear-shaped, with mandibles like twin buzz saw blades, it was perfectly designed for what it needed to do – cut and eat its way into the skin, and then once there, simply keep on eating.
He shouldn’t have been surprised that it was proving so formidable. This thing once fed on dinosaurs, so humans must have been a piece of cake … literally.
Hew sighed in the heavy suit and pulled up some maps of the American contamination shockwave. Color-coded rings representing the infestation spread out from several original points of contact – the airport, the lecture theater in Santa Barbara University, and the Orange County Quarantine Facility. Now, rings covered seventy-five percent of the continent. The spread was slower within the colder climates, and there were a few oases here and there, slightly slowing the spread. He hit a few keys, bringing up a spread projection – ninety percent coverage of the United States in another week. He updated again, this time to see the global perspective – the shockwaves started at the international airports, and rapidly ate up their respective countries. The projection analytics gave the world just ninety days.
Hew closed his red, gritty eyes for a few seconds, wanting to blank out the images before him. In a matter of weeks, the world had been made a different place. Borders had been closed, and no international traffic was allowed. This was by order of the United Nations, and was being enforced by each country’s respective military. A limited martial law was already in practise – limited, because venturing out meant doing so in a hazmat suit, and they were fast running out of those, as production of most goods and services had ceased.
Hew wondered what would come next … chaos, he guessed. He turned away from the screen, his shoulders slumping. So promising, so brilliant, so astute … and so out of ideas. He felt about as dumb as dirt. He licked his dry lips again and was contemplating a short break when a series of pings emanated from his computer. He frowned.
The scientist, along with the hundreds of other laboratories working on a solution, had been afforded an enormous amount of seniority and clearance – no request was too great. One of the first things he had asked for was a standing order for all international ports to be on alert for news of Dr. Carla Nero.
Like a flashbulb in his brain, Hew’s tired memory lit up scraps of information. The alert had kicked in – somewhere, someone had seen, heard from, or knew something about the whereabouts of his boss.
CONNECT – YES/NO?
He fell against the computer and hit the large square flaring on the screen.
YES.
Immediately, Hew was routed through to an incoming plane.
Please be on it, please be on it, he whispered as the pilot answered.
“Dr. Carla Nero, is she there? Put her on, please put her on, this is an emergency.”
CHAPTER 21
“Carla, thank God. What happened? Were you successful? Is everyone safe? How was Steinberg? I hope he doesn’t think he’s bringing another one of those goddamn birds in here. He’ll be shot.” Hew took a deep breath, realizing he was talking as fast as his heart was beating.
“Calm down, Hew. Too much has happened for me to answer all your questions now. I think I’ve got some
thing here – a tincture. I believe it inhibits the growth and hyper-aggression of the mite. In large doses, it may even eradicate them.”
“Side effects?”
“No idea. All our equipment was destroyed, so my evidence is line of sight only … empirical, but not confirmed. Now tell me quickly, what is the infestation status? What does the epi-curve look like?”
Hew quickly brought up the screen, already knowing it was useless. The epidemic tracking curve, or epi-curve for short, showed the progression of an outbreak over time. Normally they were either a bar chart or a line curve that had the standard bell shape describing progression – outbreak-escalation-intervention-management-reduction. However, the mite infestation graph was just a straight line, shooting up at an angle of about seventy-five degrees. It had overrun meaningful statistics within a week.
“Off the chart. The data overwhelmed the statistical analysis, rendering the graph outdated even before it was complete. It simply keeps progressing at a geometric rate.” Hew sucked in a huge breath, wondering where to start. He shook his head; like Carla, he had too much to say. He settled for a few words. “It’s bad – worse than bad and what we feared – they’ve gone airborne, like a plague. The mite eggs micro-disperse – they’re nanoscopic and can be carried on the slightest breeze for miles.”
He paused, compressing his lips, forcing the words out. “We’ve got … nothing.”
He blinked, making a conscious effort to rouse himself from his depression, concern for Carla overriding his own problems. “Carla, you’ve got to be careful. Things are … different.”
“Okay Hew, we should be at LAX in around six hours,” Carla said.
“No, no, you can’t land here,” he shot back.
“For God’s sake, is the local quarantine going to give us a problem? We might have—”
“No, yes … I don’t know anymore. The infestation has gone global – there have been outbreaks in Spain, Italy, the United Kingdom, and we expect most majors to be affected by now. It’s not just our nightmare anymore.” Hew sighed. “The problem is, the machinery has already been started, and once we call a pandemic severity 5, we commence a process that rolls on by itself.”
Hew snorted sadly. “The borders are closed – nothing in or out. We called a Pan-5, and then there was an outbreak in DC … in the White House itself. They went nuts – panicked. The President and Vice President were taken to secure bunkers at opposite ends of the country – they shut the place down. No one is allowed to leave, no one is allowed to enter, and now we’re under nationwide martial law. We are effectively closed for business.”
“Hew, for God’s sake, we’re in a private jet, we can come in on a short runway. Don’t worry about the welcome home band, we can just—”
“Carla, it’s not that. It’s … the militias watching the airport – they’ll stop you from landing, or disembarking, or…” He swallowed, not wanting to frighten his boss, who obviously had no idea what had been occurring in the time they’d been away. “The militias are mostly infested, and some of them are clearly insane. We stopped being able to deal with them ages ago.”
“Oh shit,” she said slowly.
“Oh shit is right. These protocols were planned and war-gamed and computer simulated for decades, and the first time we put them into effect, guess what? We forgot one thing – the unpredictability of the human condition. People don’t do as they’re told. People basically don’t believe the government and want to get out, to get away.” He licked his dry lips. “And no wonder, because those who stayed were either killed by looters, or … changed.” Hew drew a breath.
“But how? We haven't been gone long. How did it get so bad, so quickly?”
Hew snorted, remembering. “Fear makes people coalesce into mobs … and the internet is only too happy to feed their fear. No matter how we tried to control the information, once images started to appear showing the effects of the infestation in full, frightening, bloody color, well, what do you think happened? People shit themselves. Then their fear turned to anger, and they rioted, demanding that we do something – like, yesterday!” His voice rose. “Everyone is so scared of being infested, people are being shot on doorsteps.” He was breathing like a marathon runner, the panicked pressure and pent-up stress catching up with him. “Within a few days, we went from the law of the land to the law of the jungle.”
He drew in a few deep breaths of artificial air. “It’s quieter now; people don’t go out. There’s no real reason to – the shops were raided, and it quickly became obvious that going out increased your chance of either being infested or shot. The National Guard is out – teams of very large men in blue hazmat suits riding around in sealed jeeps, shooting … anything – dogs, cats, foxes, you name it. Just animals for now, but …” He let the implication hang there. He didn’t want to spell out what he thought the next steps in Control and Management might be.
Carla’s voice was more exasperated than surprised. “Jesus Christ, Hew, I’m so sorry.” He heard her laugh tiredly. “You know, you’ve got to hand it to us humans. With all our sophistication and technology, we’re still only one lightning strike away from savagery.”
Hew lowered his head; he knew he was out of his depth. He needed help; he needed Carla here. “Yeah … so, some divine assistance would be welcome right about now.” He laughed softly. “Anyway, forget about my day … how was yours?”
Carla laughed. For the first time, he heard genuine pleasure in her voice – probably relief that he was retaining his sense of humor. “Aw, you know, we went down to a little bit of paradise, ate tropical fruit, and swam in blue lagoons. What else do you do in the Amazon?” There was silence for a few seconds, before her voice grew serious. “Hew, what now?”
“Now? Now, we need you here, ASAP. We need your expertise and management. I just can’t deal with everything, and frankly, I’ve hit more brick walls than I care to admit. Most importantly, we need to run tests on that solution you’ve got.” He paused to gather his thoughts. “We need to get you back to Atlanta, one way or another. You can’t come in to a normal airport. We can find a cleared runway close to us – there should be a safe place to set down, but that’s all we can do. You’ll have to come to us, I’m afraid. Can you do that?”
Hew heard a muffled conversation as Carla discussed it with someone else on the plane. “Sure, just give us the coordinates. And you’re at CDC home base, yes?”
“That’s right; Lab-6 … hell, we’ve commandeered all the labs,” he said.
“Are … are the streets clear? Safe?” she asked cautiously.
“Yes and no. We’ll organize an escort when you get to the outskirts, but there are militias out on the highways, and at night, you’ll need to find a safe place. It’s a funny world out there – people are scared, people are hiding – people are killing themselves, and each other.” He breathed in deeply, feeling concern for her, but also feeling more confident than he had in weeks. “Good luck, and godspeed.”
“Same to you … see you soon, hopefully.” Her voice faded out, and he lifted his head and closed his eyes. He hadn’t told her everything; he couldn’t, not yet. Get her here first, that was his priority. He opened his eyes and whispered to the ceiling. “Please, God.”
*****
Carla turned to the pilot. “Did you get any of that?”
“Some. So, I guess LAX is out, and we are being directed to … where exactly?”
Carla turned back to the front window. “Not sure … Hew is sending coordinates. But I know it’ll be close to the CDC headquarters in Atlanta. How much extra time until we can get there?”
The pilot stared at her for a few seconds before blowing air out through compressed lips. “Well, it was just on five hours to LA. We had plenty of fuel to make that, but if we have to divert across most of the continent … well, I don’t think time will be the issue. Either we drop short, or we find a place to refuel.” He raised his eyebrows. “These things can get pretty heavy when the engines stop wo
rking.” The pilot turned back to the cockpit window and seemed to ruminate for a second or two. “Rough down there, huh?”
“Rough? Yeah, a perfect storm sort of rough. And we’re about to fly right into it.”
“Okay. Do me a favor, then? Ask your man if there are any refueling stations I can use. I only need about a quarter of a tank for the hop, but without that I won’t make it all the way.”
Carla nodded, pulled the headphones down over her ears, and connected once again. As she spoke to the scientist again, the gravity of the situation became even bleaker.
“Okay, thanks, hang on, Hew.” She pulled the phones off her head. “He wants to know how far you can get before you’re empty.”
The pilot looked at his dash, checking dials and computer screens showing weather, speed, altitude, and fuel, taking them all in and calculating his best chances. “Well, we’ve currently got a slight tailwind over the central states. If I take us up another few thousand feet, we can probably squeeze an extra few miles out of her. I think I can get us somewhere between St Louis and Memphis, maybe a few miles farther, if we’re lucky. You an Elvis fan?”
Carla grinned. “Who isn’t?” She passed the information on to Hew, who was obviously relaying it on to someone else. Carla nodded, pushed one of the cups back off her ear, and turned to the pilot. “Okay, he says there are plenty of smaller airports there you can use, depending on how far you get – obviously the closer to Atlanta the better.” She put her hand to the headphones, listening.
“They want to know where you think you can get to. If we can get to the city outskirts, they’ll meet us and bring us in from there.”
The pilot looked at the control panel again, his eyes narrowing. “You know, I’ve spent some time in Tullahoma. How would that be? If I can make it that far, then at least it’s somewhere I’m familiar with, and it puts you about one-ninety miles from Atlanta.”
Carla nodded and pulled the headphones back over her ear. “Hew, what about Tullahoma?”
