Sector C (13 page)

“No one, not one of these men and women out here wants to be the cause of anyone, let alone a
child
, becoming gravely ill or, heaven forbid,
dying
. But they’re also going to need rock-solid, signed-by-the-devil proof that it’s their healthy-looking cattle or milk they’re sending to market that’s caused it.”

The vet’s irate blast was not wholly unexpected. Bitterness, confusion and anger were common reactions, Mike knew, to any type of health news that could affect a person’s livelihood. But theoretic knowledge couldn’t hold a candle to standing there seeing the worry on a lined cowboy’s face and hearing the acrimony in an angered woman’s voice. A civil but uneasy interview —
that
he’d been prepared for, had steeled
himself
for. He’d even been ready for someone putting a rifle in his face and running him off the ranch.
But this kind of passion — the kind that wasn’t unreasonable, the kind that was rational, logical — wasn’t so easily countered or run away from.
It was the kind that ground him up inside and spit him out in two directions.

He wasn’t here to counsel. Not yet anyway. Not until the CDC had the facts in hand and the proof these cowboys needed — deserved — to have. He was nothing more than an objective observer putting the pieces of a complex puzzle together. He didn’t know yet what the puzzle’s final picture would look like, but he did know that the picture was already determined and that the pieces fit only one way. No amount of denial or rhetoric or even insistence on anyone’s part was going to change the final result. Science — statistics, empirical evidence and hard facts — alone would be accountable in the end. For that, Mike was grateful.

“I only want to get at the truth, whatever that truth might be,” Mike said. “It would help if I had someone who knows this area and its people, and who can think clearly and logically, to help me connect the dots. Would you be willing to work with me for a few days?”

Only a slight widening of her green eyes betrayed Donna’s surprise at the question. The unexpectedness of this man’s visit and his theory that whatever she’d been dealing with for the past weeks was communicable to humans had shocked her to the bone.
Not that she hadn’t considered the possibility,
but she’d seen nothing to support it.
Not that couldn’t be explained by other causes.
So if the government was going to get involved, she wanted to be sure that any conclusions reached were fully backed by due diligence and proof, not conjecture and a need to pander to public opinion. She was being given the opportunity to ensure the facts, and to be one of the first to know what the outcome of the investigation would be and what the fallout would mean to the animals, her clients and the region itself.

If this thing did prove to be communicable, things would get ugly fast. Almost unconsciously she began to steel herself for such an eventuality.

“I have a man’s dreams to kill right now. Stay and help me with that and afterward I’ll be glad to help with your investigation, Mr. Shafer.”

“It’s Mike. Please, call me Mike.”

WALT THURMAN WELCOMED Grigor Volkov into his den with a lavish wave of his hand. “I understand you have some good news. A little something that’s going to keep Triple E in business once we come out the other side of this thing.”

“The news is good so far,” Dr. Volkov agreed. “But what we are looking at is far from money potential right now.”

Walt frowned. “Your colleagues tell me differently. In any case, the marketability of your research is up to the board to decide and we’re moving forward with finding a buyer. There’s an office pool to guess how much the research ultimately goes for. Care to make a bet?”

The geneticist shook his head, once, sharply.

“Your loss.
Talk to me about what we’re selling.”

Stalling wasn’t going to do anyone any good, Dr. Volkov realized. Walt would simply find his answers elsewhere. In fact, there were two or three on the team he was fairly certain were already feeding information out.
Party liners.
Dollar worshippers.
Scientists not in it for the research but for the results and recognition.
They would have been out long ago if their skills weren’t solid and their knowledge aces. But he’d always worried how they’d react when it came to a moral choice between what was right for the research and what was right for the wallet.

With a mental sigh, he settled into one of the leatherback chairs across the desk from Walt. “The disease is transmitted when a genetically altered prion — a mutant — is introduced into a healthy batch of prions. In a chain reaction, that mutant prion acts like a template, convincing the healthy, normal protein bits to fold, or mutate, the same way. The mutations occur in a consistent manner, so we can label these altered prions as a completely new strain. The bad news is that this strain doesn’t behave like any of the other nearly two dozen prion strains that have been catalogued. And what works for one of the other strains won’t necessarily work for this new one.

“We’ve found a peptide form that we can bind with copper sulfate and introduce into an infected host that convinces the altered prions to take on new, more desirable characteristics. So we’re forcing them to go through one more mutation, where they should stabilize.”

“Success rate?”

“Nearly 100 percent.”
He held up his hand when Walt smiled and clapped the desktop with his palm. “What we don’t know and what we’re testing still is what effect these new mutations will have on either a healthy body or one already diseased. The new protein bit is not an exact match for the non-diseased prion — for some reason we can’t just reintroduce normal prions and have them begin the re-imaging process. But that’s been a problem since researchers first identified mutated prions as the cause of mad cow disease.

“We also don’t know if treatment results in a permanent or temporary cure. We still need to test whether re-exposure will overwhelm the prion factory of the host and the disease-prions will simply become infectious again. Or whether manipulating the prions so many times will cause them to break down and perhaps reconfigure in wholly unexpected ways.”

“You talk like we have the luxury of time on our side.”

“I am just cautioning that this may well be a case in which the cure really does prove worse than the disease. Only thorough testing will determine that.”

“How would it be administered?”

“In its current form, through vaccine.
In this case, it would be preferable, I think, to vaccinate after the disease has been contracted.”

“Any species?”

“Mammals, yes.
Though I would hesitate to use vaccinated animals in the human food supply.
Perhaps further testing would dispel my doubts.”

“What about wild animals?
Vermin?
Carriers that can’t be vaccinated?”

“Authorities in south Texas used to set out bait laced with rabies vaccine for the stray dog and coyote populations. Was it effective?
Probably with the animals that came in contact with the bait and took it.
But is there any way to truly gauge which animals get enough viable vaccine to be protected? And how do you bait deer and mice and squirrels?”

“Are you saying once this gets loose it can’t be stopped?”

“Temperature seems to have an effect. A warmer climate does prompt faster, more aggressive mutation. If it gets loose, I would say we should all start praying for another Ice Age.”

“We’ve got to stay ahead on this one. I’m going to set up an emergency web conference next week with the major pharmaceutical manufacturers. I’ll see who wants to buy in to our research and partner with us to manufacture and distribute a vaccine for a theoretical epidemic that our computer models are predicting could be unlike anything we’ve ever seen. I want you on the call to explain the biochemistry.”

“You realize two weeks doesn’t even cover the first phase of testing?”

“Whether or not your vaccine actually works doesn’t matter right now. I’ve got to get a fire under these CEO butts and get contractual funding in place before this disease starts making news. I need a prototype, a calendar and quantity projections for domestic human and veterinary distribution as well as projections for taking it global. I need that yesterday. I’ll call on the board to ante up some willing guinea pigs to expedite your testing.

“Any questions?
Then I suggest we get started.”  

“DAMN.”

Mike simply stared at the Pad-L as the latest trending results spiked nearly off the screen. The message texted to him this morning had been short and sweet:
Areawide Red Alert
.

From the TV in the corner of the hotel dining room, a broadcaster’s words wormed their way through the numbness that had clamped around his brain. He listened to the local report with growing alarm.

“…
are
sending patients to Bismarck hospitals for treatment. If you have a need for emergency care that is not related to the current outbreak, expect long waits at area hospitals and clinics.

“Again, doctors are urging that if you notice poor motor control or confusion, especially in your children or older adults, get to a hospital immediately. We’ll have more details as to what you can do to prevent this debilitating disease as we know more. Stay tuned to this station for any breaking news …
”

Local news feeds would quickly work their way to regional news then national. A Red Alert would mean CDC resources would be freed up and dispatched quickly to the area. They’d start with the hospitals, investigating the patients and interviewing the case doctors and administrators.

The lab team he’d thought would be here had already been reassigned. The CDC field teams would play catch-up over the next couple of days while better-trained personnel back in Atlanta and DC analyzed the facts and made their own connections.

Now that the area was in a Red Alert, the observations of a simple statistical analyst wouldn’t mean squat to the teams on the ground. He’d just become excess baggage. But his plane ticket home to Atlanta was for six days out. Besides, he’d already enlisted a partner and a little further investigating on his own would keep him busy in this remote town.

A commotion at the entrance to the dining room drew his attention to five people — three men and two women — dressed in crisp white shirts, lab coats and perfectly creased slacks. Badges pinned to their lapels identified them as CDC employees. Maybe it was simply the advantage of the group and those grave expressions that made them appear confident and capable. Or maybe it was the authorial feel of those white lab coats. Whatever the prompt, simply watching them move together to their table was mesmerizing. And if they communicated such a strong air of competence even to him, Mike knew the casual observer would be doubly swayed.

Mike was under no delusion that he inspired that level of confidence. It wasn’t just the jeans and sport shirt he habitually wore. He simply couldn’t carry off the look. Mussed hair that refused to stay
parted,
a relaxed and open expression despite how serious any given situation might be and a slight hesitation to his movements collectively marked him as second string.

He debated whether or not to introduce himself to the group, in the end deciding they probably wouldn’t welcome his theories before they’d had a chance to create their own. If he dug up anything they needed to know, Kevin, his boss, could track them down. Besides, they’d be receiving distilled versions of his daily reports to guide their investigation.

He turned his attention back to his charts. Fifteen more children admitted to ERs, another infant death and another 6 percent rise in stroke diagnoses since yesterday. After this morning’s news reports and the run on area hospitals they’d be triggering, he had no doubt tomorrow’s numbers would be much, much higher.

The increase in stroke patients, however, still niggled at him. He isolated the stroke cases and scanned the associated data, especially comparing occupations. By themselves, the numbers meant little. Juxtaposed with what he’d seen at the Rocking Sun Ranch yesterday, however, they appeared to offer another clue. Nearly 20 percent were “retired,” a number he thought quite low given the typical age of stroke occurrence. But a 67 percent majority, mainly among patients 28 to 74, seemed to bear out his suspicions that some cases might have been misdiagnosed. Even in a predominantly rural area, that seemed to be a high percentage of people involved in “farming, ranching or other agricultural work.”