The Patron Saint of Plagues

by Barth Anderson

  Stark gave a hurried good-bye before Joaquin disappeared; then he turned his attention back to the Ghanaian report. He found it difficult to concentrate, though; his thoughts were humming with the hope of having Joaquin Delgado’s vast experience at his disposal.

  While skimming it, Stark said to Mum, “You assimilated the Mexican epi data, Mum?”

  “Correct, Doctor.”

  “What did you find?”

  “I found incidences of an unexplained malady at a poverty clinic in northern Ascensión. Dr. Miguel Cristóbal flagged it, and I thought you might find it interesting as well.”

  Stark glanced out the window and saw the plane’s shadow snaking across the ground below. They would be landing any moment. “Sounds promising. And?”

  “A Dr. Sierra reported to the Holy Renaissance that he was dealing with several incidents of a mysterious digestive problem combined with mouth pustules and wanted advice.”

  He had cued Mum to respond to words like “unexplained,” “mysterious,” and “anomalous” when assessing epidemiological data. But it didn’t always work. “Digestive tract, eh? Great, Mum. Keep that flagged. I’m going to finish this Ghana report and meanwhile, I want you to send the genomics on Ghana’s nanophage to Bela and tell her it may be a tool we can use, may not. I’ll check in again as soon as I can, Mum.”

  Stark scanned through the rest of the cotton Union report, but found nothing that would indicate that Ghana’s dengue was anything other than garden-variety dengue. The epidemiologist even went so far as to include a chicken report, showing the population of the cotton-growing region and its communal response to dengue’s appearance among them. Mexico’s virus had entrenched in 68 percent of Ascensión. Ghana’s dengue, less than 2 percent. Stark blinked the report shut, filed the icon, and began peeling off his face tags. Perhaps he was being foolhardy, dismissing a theory of Joaquin’s so quickly. But he could return to the material and sift through it more thoroughly once he was in Ascensión.

  Stark swept off his goggles and watched the suburbs stream beneath his window as he packed his brain gear. With Mexico and Texas knuckle-locked at the border, less than a hundred miles away, the Houston burbs were now a repository for refugees and itinerant Texans. In the clustering subdivisions below, refugee encampments sprawled like insane street fairs. Corrugated metal shacks surrounded gutted buses and people thronged in cul-de-sacs turned free clinics.

  The C-130 swung around and Stark could see Houston International now. He pulled the leather bag holding his brain gear close. West of the airport, Stark could see distant columns of smoke where American and Mexican missile drones vied for position along the Guadalupe River.

  A moment later, the plane was bumping down the runway in Houston, taxiing toward the airport. It stopped long before it got there, and Stark could see loaders filing up to the C-130, ready to remove its contents. That’s when he looked down at one of the crates and realized he’d been shipped to Houston with parts for war drones.

  Climbing down the ladder from the cargo hold, Stark frowned beneath Houston’s crushing humidity. Though only midmorning, the tarmac felt like a griddle as he shouldered his luggage and walked with the four lieutenants toward the airport. To do so, they had to run a gauntlet of young peddlers with net bags of plump grapefruits and marionettes of President Orbegón with cartoon, bandito moustaches, jigging on strings to attract buyers.

  “No, thanks,” Stark growled, muscling past the vendors. Five other boys immediately swung in front of him, hoisting fruit and toys in his face. “No, thanks, I said, now let me—”

  Suddenly, two of the boys cried out in pain and jumped back from Stark, rubbing their elbows and scowling. The mob of young vendors parted and Stark could see a lit cigarette bouncing on the tarmac before a girl of ten or so, who was smiling a sweet but arch smile for such a young face. “For two hundred dollars,” she said in a deep Southern accent. It sounded like, “Yew c’n mike the dictitor day-ance.” Her Orbegón puppet bounced and capered madly.

  The boys slid away from her and followed the lieutenants toward the sliding doors of the airport, leaving Stark to walk with the imp.

  “Come on, Yankee, you can spare it.” She matched his stride. “You got a place to stay in Houston?”

  “Ain’t staying in Houston,” said Stark, and immediately regretted it. He was now in a conversation.

  “US Army, ain’t you? Hey, hey, what do you say? Lend a buck to the USA?” she said, quoting a popular tune from the Border War. Midair, President for Life Orbegón knelt and held a hand out to Stark.

  Stark figured what the hell. Two hundred was a cheap meal for him. In the drained Houston economy, it was probably a day’s work. He fished out two crumpled C-notes from his front pocket and handed them to the girl. “Keep the puppet.”

  “Thanks, Yank. Want me to carry your bags or something?”

  Stark looked up and grimaced at the oppressive Texas sun. Still a hundred yards from the airport and the back of his shirt was already damp. “Why not?” Stark handed her his lugall but kept the case with his brain gear.

  The puppet seller handled the bag awkwardly but Stark didn’t offer to take it back. She swung the strap across her slim shoulders, almost toppling, and led the way, reaching into her breast pocket for a cigarette, lighting it with a rusty flame lighter. “Need a ride somewhere?”

  Stark’s public health reflex kicked. “A kid your age? Shouldn’t smoke. Causes all kinds of nasty—”

  “Don’t worry. I don’t really smoke,” said the girl, inhaling deeply and grinning wickedly. The lighter clacked shut. “Anyway, don’t hang around the airport too long. Tempers high today.”

  Fifty feet from the airport, Stark could feel cool air gasping from the entrance’s sliding doors. “Whose tempers?”

  “Everybody’s. Federals approved the draft.”

  “That’s got folks riled? Why?”

  “Guess you ain’t US Army.” She gave him an annoyed glance. “We got a last-minute land grab going on between here and Austin. Militias jockeying for position before the US Blues bring in their draftees.” She drew at her cigarette. “There were two shootouts yesterday in the food court.”

  Stark followed his guide into Houston International, and the cool air was a relief, even though the place smelled terrible.

  The airport was more market than terminal, with stalls of food vendors packing the central concourse. Wet sides of beef hung from tent crossbeams, swinging over pint baskets of shrimp and red filets of marlin on ice. Card tables held pyramids of oranges and lemons, and racks of mother-boards were displayed under a sign reading THE CHAIRMAN’S. As soon as vendors saw the passengers, the hawking started.

  “I got mandarins! Texas satsuma manda-rinos!”

  “Gulf shrimp! Right off the boat! Gulf shrimp!”

  “Meow!” shouted a woman with whiskered, whole catfish. “Meow!”

  “Sammy Houston Original! Mama bottled it herself! Home brew heeere!”

  If any vendors got too close to Stark, the puppet seller waved them back with the lit end of her cigarette. “See? Kid my size has to have a weapon. Anyway, where you meeting your ride, Yank?”

  Stark realized he had been given no clue, no secret phrase with which to find El Mono’s emissaries. He glanced at the nearest vendors, the Asian shrimp boaters. Would the Mexicans be in disguise? Perhaps they would prefer posing as the Hispanic leather workers. Stark scanned the crowd of ratty-haired, Caucasian women selling ganja buds as thick as their dreds, the pale-eyed cattlemen, Hmong cowboys at their tobacco stall, the Afro-Cubans in big-pocketed guayabera shirts, the Jewish men in yamulkas, prayer shawls, and snakeskin boots, and all the rival uniforms—Republic of Texas, US Army, the West Texas Confederacy—brushing against one another between vendor stalls. Holy Renaissance officers would stand out like Thoroughbreds in this mishmash. Stark sucked his teeth. “I’m not sure where to meet my ride.”

  “I’ll take you down to the old baggage claim,” said the girl. “Some
folks still think airbuses stow luggage.”

  They pushed their way through the market and Stark was glad to have his guide. She moved like a wedge in front of him, the cherry of her cigarette clearing their way with shouts of surprise and pain.

  She came to a stop when she found a dense crowd that wouldn’t part for her. It was a ring of officers cheering beneath a netmonitor. Stark squinted at the face shown there and realized it was the bespectacled President of Mexico, Emil Orbegón, addressing his people on the outbreak. “Wait, miss. Wait a minute!”

  “They been showing that all morning,” the girl said, bored.

  Stark edged forward so he could read the subtitles through the broadcast’s blurry reception. “What he say?”

  The girl made a dismissive gesture with her cigarette, like listen if you want, then took a drag. “Blaming us for something in the capital.”

  Trying to ignore the war whoops of the officers, Stark read the words scrawling below Orbegón’s chin and cravat, tied in a perfect Cancún knot.

  “…not a heroic act of war, but a cowardly act of bioterrorism. Two genetically engineered viruses have been released upon the civilians in our great capital. One is meant to weaken us, the second is meant to kill.”

  For Mexico’s sake, Stark hoped Diego Alejandro didn’t write that awful description of dengue hemorrhagic fever.

  “Now, whether these diseases were designed in the United States, Great Britain, France, or Germany,” Orbegón said, “I promise you, mexicanistas, I will bring the culprits to justice. I promise, too, that I will repair the pilone network as soon as humanly possible, so that you may communicate with your priests and churches. But while I slave for you, promise me that you will cooperate with our Ministry of Health. Promise me that you will wear the gloves and masks being distributed in your neighborhoods, and promise that you will lay down your arms against the police attempting to protect you.”

  Stark started as if splashed with water. “The hell?”

  “They rioting in the streets down there,” grinned a young man with straight white teeth. He nudged Stark like they were watching a sporting event. “Their ‘sacred service’ killed a couple hundred so far! Rioters think the Holy Renaissance released the viruses, but don’t you hope we infected em? Ho, man, what a hoot and a half if the ol’ U.S. of A. pulled this off!”

  Stark backed out of the cluster of officers and found the girl again. Mum had said nothing about rioting. Widespread civic violence would make his rings of hot labs and perimeter clinics virtually useless. He made a note to himself to find out why Mum hadn’t reported this. “Let’s go, kid,” said Stark, turning away from Orbegón. “I can hear the rest later.”

  As they walked down a flight of stationary escalators, Stark saw two Hispanic-looking men on the floor below. Both wore the stiff-brimmed hats and brown uniforms of Texas Rangers. The five-pointed stars on their chests shone like little mirrors. The taller of the two carried a sign that read, HENRY DAVID ESTARQUE.

  Stark smirked at the disguise. It was a good choice. Stark had heard from officers back in Minneapolis that the Rangers were loose and powerful cannons, allying themselves somewhere between the Republic of Texas and the old state Railroad Commission. The United States was trying desperately to form an alliance between Texas splinter groups, bringing in drafted soldiers to serve alongside Railroad Men and Texas Republicans. But the Rangers refused to sign off on the Fed’s stated willingness to use nukes on Texas soil, so the Rangers remained fiercely independent. Three US soldiers, waiting for transport on the lower level, stole fearful looks at the two Rangers.

  “I’m Dr. Stark,” Stark called to them from the escalator.

  The girl shushed him violently. “You crazy? They Rangers, man!”

  Stark said, “Don’t worry. I know them.”

  “You do, huh?” the girl said with a flat, wary voice.

  “Henry David? From Wisconsin?” said the shorter of the two Rangers, strolling forward to greet him at the base of the escalators. “My pleasure. I Sergeant Weitzel. This here Lieutenant Valesquez.” He took Stark’s hand as Stark stepped onto the ground floor.

  The girl kept her eyes on the Rangers’ stars as the three men shook hands.

  “I ready,” said Stark. “You guys got a car nearby?”

  “Right outside,” said Weitzel.

  Lieutenant Valesquez, a tall, glowering man with a bad complexion, said nothing, but he matched distrustful stares with the puppet seller.

  “Where y’all goin?” said the girl as she walked alongside Stark, refusing to relinquish his lugall.

  They passed through the sliding-door exit and back into the blast furnace of Houston midday heat.

  Valesquez raised his finger as if he were drawing a gun and pointed to a glossy black sedan in the airport’s roundabout. “None of your business.”

  “You Rangers goin to Bastrop?”

  Stark didn’t understand the tension that suddenly straightened the spines of the two agents.

  “Maybe.” Sergeant Weitzel tilted his head back and forth, making the brim of his hat seesaw. “Maybe not.”

  “Gonna put the bite on the PAT once and for all, ain’t you?” said the girl.

  Sergeant Weitzel remained military stoic but tilted that hat brim side to side again. “No, ma’am, we’re not.”

  Valesquez waited by the passenger door and Weitzel fumbled for his keys. A good detail for the American disguise, Stark thought, having a “car” that needed “keys.”

  While Weitzel opened the driver’s side, and lanky Valesquez folded himself into the sedan, the girl put a hand on Stark’s arm and whispered, “They ain’t Rangers.”

  Stark was impressed. “No?”

  “Aw, man. You knew that already.”

  “Relax. These guys aren’t going to hurt me.”

  “Maybe. But don’t let them take you through Bastrop.”

  Stark leaned toward her. “Bastrop dangerous?”

  “That town belongs to the People’s Army. These guys think they cute in their Ranger stars, but they in a world of crap if they bump into the PAT.”

  Stark opened the back door and slipped his brain gear inside, then he took his lugall from the girl. After he stashed it, he reached into his pocket. “Thanks, miss. Look. Take another C. Don’t tell no one you saw me, OK?”

  “You all right. I hope you know what you doin, though.” She kissed the bill. “Adios, amigo.”

  Stark saluted the girl and crawled into the car.

  Weitzel started the engine and pulled out of the loading zone, veering between a truckload of watermelons and a big, Caucasian family waiting to cross the street, all holding hands.

  “Reminds me of a joke,” said Weitzel. He maneuvered the car into the exit queue. “Why did the Anglo cross the road?”

  Valesquez chuckled like an indulgent father. “Why?”

  “He saw a peso on the other side.”

  Weitzel and Valesquez laughed together, a little too long and a little too loud.

  Stark figured he was missing nuances and ignored the slur. Enough Americans had told Mexican jokes over the years to draw several decades of return fire. “So,” said Stark. “We going to Bastrop?”

  The laughter dried into a sober silence. Valesquez showed Stark his profile. “As a matter of fact, yes,” he said. The older man was obviously a native Spanish speaker with his crisp accent. “It is the only corridor into Tejas that is not patrolled by the Blues.”

  As they approached the exit’s checkpoint, Stark buckled his safety belt. The car smelled like leather and gun oil. Weitzel flashed the airport’s security bot a laser ID and Stark fussed with his seat belt. He didn’t want to think about the staggering number of battalions, squadrons of jets, missile drones, and satellites focused on the border he was about to cross. Calming his rising anxiety, Stark forced himself to think about the outbreak, the riots. He had the urge to wrestle into his brain gear and find out more about the rioting. “You guys hooked up?”

 
“Of course,” Valesquez replied like he was waiting for the question. He tapped his temple where Stark could see the faint white end of a scar disappearing into his hairline. “But the network is down temporarily.”

  “I know. But you must have heard something about the riots in Ascensión.”

  The car swerved hard from the airport’s boulevard. A moment later they were jockeying in four lanes of traffic on a crowded three-lane highway. Once he was in his lane, Weitzel looked at Valesquez. Valesquez looked over the back seat at Stark. “What have you heard?”

  “I heard about a hundred were killed.”

  “We’ve lost a lot more than that,” said Valesquez in a slow, dark voice.

  “Were these riots citywide? Were they near the hot zones?” Stark asked.

  Valesquez adjusted his tie. Cancún knot. “I am not at liberty to say.”

  “The riots, they affecting the quarantine?”

  “I told you, I am not at liberty to say, Dr. Stark.”

  “Screw liberty. Don’t you care?” Stark snorted in disbelief. Then he reconsidered. Perhaps the cloaks and daggers had already been donned and drawn. Perhaps the Holy Renaissance was deliberately keeping these officers in the dark to protect them. Stark was making a sincere observation when he said, “Maybe you guys don’t even know who I am.”

  Weitzel looked like he was gnawing an angry bone as he drove. “¿Piensa que estamos idiotas?”

  “Don’t worry. We know you.” Valesquez held up the little placard, HENRY DAVID ESTARQUE, and gave it to Stark.

  Weitzel managed a smile. “You comin’ to save poor old Mexico, that it, yanqui?” The smile turned leering and sarcastic as he met Stark’s eye in the rearview mirror. “‘Maybe you don’t know who I am.’ Chinga, you gringos still think you own the world.” The car accelerated as Weitzel grew angrier with every word he spoke. “You all so damn vain, you make me sick. You still think you’re better than us. Even after we carve you up like a roast and eat—”

  “Sergeant.” Valesquez touched Weitzel’s thigh, and the car decelerated. Valesquez then looked over his shoulder at Stark and lowered his eyes in apology.