Just Life

by Neil Abramson

  “Perhaps you should’ve thought of that before taking the one cell phone with the unknown number.”

  “Damn. Didn’t think about that. Did you find something?”

  “Pieces. I can’t connect them yet. But there’s an issue.”

  Sam’s stomach dropped. “Are they coming for my dogs?”

  “Not yet. I couldn’t understand Greg completely, but it has something to do with some trouble with your friend Andy.”

  “I’ll call them.”

  “Did you speak to Morgan?” Daniel asked.

  “Yeah, but she wasn’t talking. So we followed her.”

  “To where?”

  “Dutchess County.”

  “What the hell for?”

  Sam wasn’t in the mood for parental judgment. “Because that’s where she was going.”

  “Well, stop playing games and get back here as soon as you can.”

  “Listen, where do I know the name VetMed Biologics from?”

  Daniel was silent for almost a full minute.

  “Dad?” Sam asked. “You there?”

  “You don’t know the name,” he said. His voice suddenly sounded somber and far away.

  “But you do, don’t you?”

  “I did. That entity no longer exists,” he said defensively.

  “It does.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I’m looking at it. That’s where we followed Morgan to.”

  Sam heard something on the phone that sounded like a cross between a gasp and a moan. Her father had never made either sound before and it made Sam’s heart jump. “She wouldn’t,” he finally said.

  “Dad, you’re talking to yourself again.”

  “VetMed was a major funding source for my Bullet research. They’re a big player in agricultural vaccines for diseases prevalent in factory-farmed food animals.”

  “But you were working on a human vaccine. I had always assumed your money came from the human vaccine industry.”

  “It’s economics. Human vaccine development is now highly regulated. Farm animal vaccine development is not. It is within the jurisdiction of the—”

  “The USDA,” Sam answered.

  “Correct.”

  “Let me guess: the USDA is still underfunded and under the thumb of the huge agribusiness legislative lobby?”

  “We count on that. You have maximum flexibility to develop the vaccines on the agricultural side of the equation and then move it over toward human development. By that point you have already, how can I put this, exceeded the envelope of what might be acceptable on the human side.”

  “But if you were testing vaccines on animals for zoonotic illnesses, and if your theory of cross-species transference is true, then—”

  “Correct. Whatever you do to the animal, you eventually do to us. It is only a question of opportunity and time.”

  “What’s the relationship to the cholera?”

  “Ramses, I think. One of the most promising areas of agricultural animal vaccines is experimental adjuvants—something added to a vaccine to accelerate the immune response to the vaccination, usually to aid adsorption or to inflame the immune system. They’re sort of vaccine turbochargers, and—”

  “I know what a vaccine adjuvant is, Dad. I went to vet school too.”

  “Right, sorry. What you may not know, however, is that adjuvants are now a huge business in agriculture. Because they reduce the amount of vaccine required per dose, and the number of doses given per animal. If they can use adjuvants to make each dose more powerful, and can therefore use fewer doses per animal, then they can cover far more animals with the same amount of vaccine. It means more individual doses available for mass vaccination campaigns. Coincidentally, this is exactly the goal of government and the pharmaceutical companies who stand to make millions from their vaccines—if they can deliver them. The problem is the more dilute the vaccine, the more powerful and toxic the adjuvant must be to stimulate the immune response. VetMed started looking into some very toxic areas.”

  “What areas?”

  “Bacterial toxins.”

  “Like cholera?”

  “It was one of several on the list.”

  “That’s insane!”

  “Actually, not insane at all. Just dangerous. There were a number of studies that demonstrated the efficacy of cholera toxin as an experimental adjuvant for oral inoculation in pigs and cows. The good part is that it is highly toxic and triggers a strong mucosal immunity response in amounts that should not cause harm to the host. The bad part is that it is—”

  “—Fucking cholera, Dad!”

  “Well, yes, there is that. And the proposed delivery mechanism required more than a little. Add that to the fact that you don’t really want to be in the business of manufacturing cholera toxin, and you get the picture.”

  “How deep were you in this shit?”

  “Not too far. Even I have my own limited standards. But Morgan said yes to the research.”

  “Why am I not surprised?”

  “She completed a study in which she concluded that bacterial toxin was an effective and safe adjuvant for a number of food animal vaccines. I had my doubts, so I paid off one of her assistants to get me the data sets.”

  “Why?”

  “I could tell you that I was on a crusade to protect us all from dangerous bacterial adjuvants, but the reality is that if she succeeded and I was wrong, I wanted in on it.”

  “Oh,” Sam said as she fought the memory of her snickering classmates.

  “Yes, I know,” her father said. “Another proud moment in your family history. But I wasn’t wrong in my assumption. Morgan had falsified the data. I called her on it and obtained certain promises from her in exchange for keeping my discovery quiet.”

  “You blackmailed her?”

  “A little.”

  “But you didn’t stop her.”

  “I thought I did, but then the accident happened and…” Their shared loss hung in the momentary silence between them.

  “So why does my dog have cholera?”

  “I don’t know, but it is hard to believe that is coincidence, given where you are standing and Ramses.”

  “And what about rabies?”

  “That one makes no sense. There’s no crosswalk between these dogs with cholera and canine rabies that I can find.”

  “Are you telling me the truth?”

  “About this? Yes. Ramses had nothing to do with rabies. No one is seriously researching rabies vaccination anymore because there’s no money in it. Rabies is all pets and wildlife, not livestock. The current vaccination protocols are long established and working fine.”

  “What are you saying, Dad?”

  “Maybe Riverside really does have a naturally occurring canine rabies crisis on its hands. There are reports of another rabid dog—this time in Central Park. People are being warned away.”

  “But if that’s the case—”

  “Then many dogs in Riverside are as good as dead. They’ve already established the quarantine. The next step will be a cull.”

  “There must be a connection. What are we missing?”

  “I need to make some calls,” Daniel said. “In the meantime, don’t do anything stupid.”

  Yeah, right, Sam thought as she ended the call.

  Beth emerged from the woods with a satisfied smile and a quarter of the roll of paper towels. “Look at me,” she called, and did a quick pose with the paper towels. “I’m finally at one with nature.”

  “Get in the car.”

  Beth hopped in. “What’d I do now?”

  Sam hit the accelerator and shot out of the driveway so fast her wheels squealed.

  Beth stared at her. “You gonna talk to me, Thelma, or do I just have to guess where the cliff is?”

  Sam drove for about a hundred yards, turned off onto a dirt path that looked as if it had once served as a horse trail, and cut the engine. “You stay here,” she said.

  “Come again?”


  “Stay put. I’m going back to the facility.”

  “I think they were pretty clear they didn’t want to see you.”

  “That’s why you need to stay here. With your record you can’t afford to be picked up for trespassing.”

  “Do you have any idea what you’re doing at this point?”

  “Honestly? No, except Morgan can be in there right now destroying more files and data that we need unless I can stop her.”

  “Then I’m coming with you.”

  “Not an option this time. I’m sorry, hon.”

  Beth covered her head with her arms.

  “What the hell are you doing?” Sam asked.

  “This is the point where you knock me unconscious for my own good so I don’t follow you.”

  8

  Luke drove his daughter’s small truck with “Heaven Scent Florist and Nursery—Nothing Else in Brooklyn Smells This Good!” signage to the park entrance at 108th Street. He cut the engine and jumped out of the cab. Gabriel and Andy, his backpack stuffed with his violin case and packages of meat, followed.

  Gabriel read one of the postings that had been plastered every few feet on the stone wall encircling the park. Considering the bold black letters, the devil-red background, and the overuse of exclamation points, there could be no question that someone wanted the message to be noticed and obeyed.

  Gabriel called Luke and Andy over to look:

  WARNING! HEALTH EMERGENCY! HAZARDOUS AREA!

  The park will be closed to all dogs at 5:00 p.m. until further notice. No parking or unattended vehicles on this block after 5:00 p.m. Violators will be towed and fined. Absolutely no exceptions! Hazardous poisoned bait in use. Any dog found in the park after 5:00 p.m. will be subject to quarantine. Entry into the park after 5:00 p.m. will be deemed unconditional consent to search by proper authorities.

  By order of the state Department of Environmental Protection and the Governor of the state of New York.

  In the face of the severity of the posting, Gabriel thought their plan was absurdly simple—find any strays, get them in the truck, and then drive them through the perimeter and to the shelter. They needed to do all this before the DEP closed the park and began its search-and-contain operation.

  Gabriel pointed a thumb at the poster and spoke to Luke. “Looks like we only have an hour before we become the newest guests on America’s Most Wanted. Your daughter’s name is on the truck registration so you’ll need to stay with the truck in case someone comes.”

  “Right,” Luke answered. “But how’re you going to get them all without me?”

  Gabriel turned to Andy: “So you think ten, right?”

  “I’ve only seen ten,” Andy said. “I don’t know how many there really are.”

  “It’s gonna be hard enough to get the ten,” Gabriel said.

  “But—” Andy started to protest.

  “We’ll take as many as we can,” Gabriel agreed to avoid an argument. “But we need to get started now or else it won’t matter.”

  Andy was already moving before Gabriel had finished his sentence.

  “Call me on the cell when you’re on the way out,” Luke said. Gabriel nodded and jogged after the boy.

  Once Gabriel caught up, he asked, “How’re we going to find them?”

  “Just stay behind me.”

  As they walked through the north end of the park, Gabriel noticed joggers, cyclists, walkers, Rollerbladers, people just sitting on the grass, and several dogs attached to their owners by leash, but that was all. Not even an untended pile of shit, he thought. “Any ideas?”

  “They’ve gotten really good at hiding,” Andy answered innocently. “A few more feet.”

  Andy brought them to a stop and pointed to a copse of trees surrounding a large rock outcropping.

  Although the trees were thick in some places, Gabriel could see through them to the rock formation. There were no dogs anywhere.

  “Wait here,” Andy said.

  With a growing unease Gabriel watched Andy walk to the trees. Had he already failed this boy in the one way that mattered? Could it be that Andy’s historical demons had caused him to create this fantasy about a Central Park Pack? If that was the case, the challenge would be to convince Andy to rejoin reality without inviting some type of psychotic break. Gabriel knew that his own current condition left him too weak to accomplish that task.

  These thoughts dissipated in an instant when the boy moved into the trees and suddenly was gone. Not just obscured by branches and leaves, but vanished. “Holy crap,” Gabriel muttered. He recalled the boy’s words about the dogs: “They’ve gotten really good at hiding.”

  “Yeah, no kidding,” he said.

  Gabriel sensed a tingle at the base of his neck just as a slight wind picked up. A cold breeze passed across his brow although the air was hot and the trees were still. He felt refreshed, as if he had just showered and stepped into a soft, thick robe. The smell of wet snow, incongruous in the heat, filled his nose and mouth. Time fell away. It could have been two minutes or two hours before Gabriel heard Andy’s faraway voice on the breeze. “Coming out now.”

  “From where?” Gabriel whispered.

  The priest got his answer when Andy led nine dogs out between tree trunks that suddenly seemed massive, verdant, and primordial.

  The dogs looked about as dissimilar as nine dogs could be in size, hair color, hair length, age, and breed. There were recognizable pieces of Lab, golden, beagle, pit bull, Saint Bernard, Scottie, Westie, shepherd, husky, border collie, and maybe a half dozen other breeds. They had at least one thing in common, though. Excited by Andy’s proximity, they jumped, ran, and played with each other and the boy as if they were puppies, even though their physical characteristics suggested they were all older.

  “These can’t be strays,” Gabriel said when he finally found his words. “They’re too healthy, too well behaved. They belong to someone.”

  “Not to,” Andy said. “With. They belong with me.” His tone left no room for debate.

  “What is this place exactly?” Gabriel asked.

  Andy smiled at the question. “Just a safe place in a big city park.”

  Gabriel was about to press further, but concluded that this was one of those times when greater inspection would not bring enlightenment. “Is this everyone?”

  “There’s one more I need to find. She’s not here.”

  “Let’s get these in the truck and we can come back for her.” Andy hesitated at the suggestion. “We can’t risk leaving these nine, can we?” Gabriel pressed.

  Andy reluctantly nodded his agreement.

  Gabriel looped slipknot leashes on the dogs, not because he needed to, but because the farther the dogs moved from the particular spot in the park where Andy had found them, the more attention they would attract. Even with the leashes and even though they still had a good thirty minutes before the deadline, something about the connection between the boy and the dogs invited stares. The fact that a tall man wearing a priest collar walked among them didn’t help mute their conspicuousness. Gabriel mentally ran through a list of explanations in case someone stopped them. None sounded plausible and he couldn’t even be sure he would be able to articulate them if pushed.

  But no one even stepped into their path. When Gabriel glanced at Andy, he began to understand why. The boy was so confident in his task, so certain that this was where he needed to be, even the priest felt sheltered in his presence.

  They made it to the truck without incident. But by the time they got the dogs settled in, they had only fifteen minutes before the Guard arrived and the efforts to cleanse the park of all canine life commenced in earnest.

  “I’ve got to go back,” Andy declared.

  “We’re cutting this too close,” Gabriel said.

  “You can go,” Andy answered. “I need to find her.”

  “But you’ll never get her out of the park, and if you do, the Guard won’t let you get to the shelter at this point. I don’t think you un
derstand how serious this has become.”

  “I’m going,” Andy said with finality.

  “I’ll go back with you,” Gabriel offered. “We’ve got a better shot with two people.” That wasn’t Gabriel’s true reason for his offer; the priest had a bad feeling about leaving the boy alone in the park that he could not attribute solely to the Guards’ activities.

  “You can’t,” Luke said. “You need to stay in the back and keep the dogs quiet while I drive. It’s the only way or we’ll never make it past the perimeter.” Luke turned to Andy. “I’ll come back for you. I’ll find out which side the surveillance is thinnest and wait for you there. Call me when you’re ready.”

  “I don’t like this at all,” Gabriel warned. “If the boy gets caught…”

  “I won’t,” Andy said as he removed his backpack. He took out several ziplock bags stuffed with cuts of raw meat and handed them to Gabriel. “Take it. It’ll keep them busy during the ride.”

  Gabriel climbed into the back of the truck just as a van from the state’s Department of Environmental Protection pulled up to the curb one block south of them. Two men in blue vinyl hazmat suits jumped out and opened the rear doors. Rows of orange canisters marked with a black skull and crossbones and labeled “HAZARD” and “POISON” stared out. A flatbed truck pulled up carrying blue-and-white police sawhorse barricades. Two cable news vans followed.

  If Gabriel had retained any lingering doubts that this was for real—that there would be loss of life—those doubts abandoned him here.

  “If you’re gonna go in,” Gabriel told Andy, “you better do it now.”

  Andy gave them a thumbs-up. “Thanks for trusting me,” he said. “Means a lot.”

  “I always trust you, son,” Gabriel said. “I just don’t understand you. Now go.”

  Andy left them at a jog in the direction of the Lake.

  9

  Sam and Beth scrambled through the woods, racing back toward the facility.

  “You realize how many ticks are probably latching onto us as we speak?” Beth asked. “I can feel the Lyme disease coursing through my bloodstream. I’ll need to start myself on doxycycline when we get back. Oh, wait, I can’t write scripts anymore.”