“You’re making that up, right?” Beth asked.
“Not at all,” Daniel answered. “It’s called a chimera vaccine. We already developed one for dengue fever and West Nile. We had experimented with one for rabies for a few years because it had the potential to cure an already symptomatic animal.”
“So it could cure animals that already have rabies?” Sam asked.
“It’s supposed to. That’s why it is valuable. It isn’t just a prophylactic like the other vaccine.”
“But how did it end up in New York City?” Beth asked.
“The convention,” Tom answered. “The vaccine was intended to be used in advance of the convention event in the park to deal with the threat of rabid raccoons, dogs, squirrels, and rats. It seems you can’t run the risk that a rabid animal will run up and bite some of the presidential nominee’s biggest donors at his own party.”
“According to VetMed,” Daniel continued, “the vaccine needed additional testing before it was ready to be used in an urban environment. They contracted with Dr. Morgan to study and provide evidence that there was no cross-species transference.”
“The same problem you couldn’t overcome with the Bullet,” Sam said.
Daniel nodded. “After they found the rabid raccoon at the Central Park work site, Morgan must have run out of time; she gave the new vaccine to dogs in her practice—”
“And Nick,” Sam added.
“It provided Morgan with the perfect opportunity for regular observation in an urban area.”
“Excuse me,” Beth cut in. “But isn’t this all a little… I don’t know… ‘mad scientist’ stuff? You really think Morgan was flying the freak flag that high?”
“You’re ignoring the context,” Daniel said. “This isn’t about crazy or evil. This is about the seduction of the science—the drive to solve the puzzle before someone else does. Morgan comes from the loosely regulated world of agricultural pharmacology like me. Our limits are largely self-imposed. Cows do not complain and they don’t report. If you believe this is the first time there’s been testing without knowledge or consent, then I envy your inexperience. And here Morgan actually believed she had solved the challenge and that the vaccine was completely safe.”
“But it wasn’t,” Sam confirmed.
“No. Like me, she really had not solved the transference problem.”
“Whatever we do to them—”
“—We are really doing to us,” Daniel completed her sentence. “The cholera toxin in the bait or something about the virus caused systemic colitis, and the inflammation must have interfered with the vaccine process. The body couldn’t properly respond to the vaccine. The dogs given the vaccine passed live rabies virus in their feces. The kids picked it up through contact and ingested it somehow—fingers in their mouths, picking their noses, who knows. But that’s why the virus was localized in Riverside. The vaccinated dogs all stayed in the area.”
“So that’s how the kids got rabies?” Beth asked.
“Yeah,” Sam said. “We gave it to them.”
“And VetMed is putting it all on Morgan,” Tom added.
“So the bus actually did pass through,” Beth said. “I wanna see the tire tracks on Morgan’s ass.”
“But why don’t the children also have cholera?” Sam challenged.
“I assume that it didn’t pass through in its virulent form,” Daniel said. “The dogs’ natural antibodies had already attacked the cholera bacteria. That’s why the dogs were sick. The body did its job in killing that organism off. The rabies, on the other hand, passed through undetected by the body because of the DNA swap.”
“Except two dogs did get rabies,” Sam reminded him.
Daniel rubbed his chin. “I wonder if that was also because of the interaction with the adjuvant or something else. After all, Morgan was screwing around with a living organism’s entire immune response in the face of two particularly virulent pathogens. And that’s probably why only kids got sick—they have less-developed immune systems.”
“And they’re not so good with the handwashing thing,” Beth added. “Trust me.”
“Where’s Morgan now?” Sam asked.
“Not far,” Crew Cut said. “The CDC is on its way here. The guys from Atlanta want to interview her. The police are here to make sure she stays put.”
“Did she destroy any more documentation?” Sam asked.
“No,” Crew Cut said. “We shut her out once I got the call and before she could do any damage.”
“We need to see her files immediately. There must be other dogs she injected that are not at the shelter. They’ll need to be identified, located, and quarantined ASAP,” Daniel directed.
“Of course,” Crew Cut said.
“So you turned out to be a good guy?” Beth asked Crew Cut.
“Just trying to do my job.”
“Sorry about that stuff I said about your mother,” Beth responded.
Crew Cut rolled his eyes and left the room.
Daniel pulled Sam to a quiet corner. “If I’m correct about this, the dogs that received the cholera-based vaccine may very well still have rabies in their system. I don’t know how long the virus can survive in an asymptomatic state. They may have been turned into some type of carriers.”
“But then how can we save them?”
“We may not be able to, although the fact that they show no signs of rabies and that no other dogs at the shelter have shown symptoms is promising. We won’t know more until we start reviewing the data. We need to find some proof that the CDC will accept.”
“Does Tom know about the sick dogs?”
“I had to tell him, but I think he had already figured that out himself—as others will soon enough.”
Tom cut in. “I just got word that there’s something going on at the shelter. The governor has made a demand for your dogs. The mayor is trying to resolve it, but…” Tom shook his head. “We need to get down there ASAP to have any chance.”
“I will stay and work through the VetMed data,” Daniel said. “There must be something helpful.” He followed Crew Cut out of the room.
“Where do you want me?” Beth asked.
“There’s only room for two and the pilot in the bird,” Tom answered. “I’ll tell the pilot to get ready.” He left them.
“Can you stay with my father for now?” Sam asked. “Help him with these files?”
“That I can do,” Beth said. “I wonder if I can find some Tab up here.”
“You know, you are pretty good in a fight. Not sure I could’ve stopped Morgan without you. Thank you.”
Beth shrugged. “It was a lot more fun than the meeting I blew off with my parole officer… which you may get a call about, by the way.”
Five minutes later Sam and Tom were ready to walk out the door. Daniel was already buried in the test data. As Sam passed him, Daniel held out her phone. “Don’t forget this.” Sam took it from his hands. “I know it means less than nothing,” Daniel said. “But I couldn’t be prouder of you.”
Sam realized that this probably was as far as her father would ever be able to go—powerful emotions always encased within the protection of cold, hard data points. Yes, that was living of a sort, all filtered through the safety of control and, because of that predictability, somehow less valuable. But that was his choice, the product of a lifetime of his experiences. Like Tom, she was not her father and she wasn’t obligated to repeat her father’s life. She refused to be only the product of what someone else had done to her. She had choices, and whether to keep her anger or not was a decision she could own.
“I wouldn’t say ‘less than nothing,’ Dad.” Sam offered her father a small smile. “Figure this one out. Save my dogs.”
18
Andy was exhausted, his nerves fried, when they finally reached the north wall. He stared at the seven-foot-high stone barrier and wanted to cry.
Tears… darkness… an empty room… rough hands. He knew he was falling backward into a dark and
hostile place.
Andy bit into the web of his hand. That brought him forward—at least for now. He shook off his despair and took the eighty-pound dog in both arms. He lifted her toward the wall, holding the dog as if making an offering to some stone god.
That was when the first convulsion hit. The dog’s paws trembled and she jerked her head backward in a gruesome spasm. Andy fought to keep hold of her, but her suffering was far too strong. He lowered her to the ground before she tumbled there.
The dog tried to crawl away from the wall as if her very proximity to the stone was painful… as if what existed beyond the wall of the park was too vast and too broken to allow her survival… as if the old man of the park had spoken the truth.
Andy tried to soothe her, but he could not find those words. Instead he said, “I’m gonna take a look around.” He climbed the wall, cutting his fingertips on the jagged stones. From the top he had a clear view of Central Park North and even Central Park West to his left. He was shocked to see that Central Park North was free of Guards and work crews. Luke had been right, north was the best direction—but if he couldn’t get the dog out, what was the point?
Andy turned back to the dog to get a sense of how hard the carry would be.
She was gone.
He jumped down from the wall, bewildered and ready to search the park for her. They had been so close to freedom—just one damn wall.
As soon as his feet hit the ground, the dog was there again in exactly the same spot where he’d left her moments before. Andy tried to convince himself that the top of the wall or his fatigue had obscured his view. He climbed the wall once more and looked for the dog from that vantage point. Again the dog was gone, and again she reappeared on the ground as soon as Andy touched down inside the park.
Twice was enough. Andy knelt down beside the dog and swallowed hard. Their eyes locked—hers wide with fear and his searching for understanding. In that moment he had his answer.
Andy lifted the dog and carried her away from the stone, back toward the center of the park. When he reached a stand of trees about a hundred feet from the wall, the dog jumped down from his arms without any sign of tremor. She trotted a few paces ahead and dropped to the ground, head on her paws.
Andy tried to determine his next move—or whether he even had one. He didn’t hear the DEP crew until they were already too close to avoid. The dog was up in an instant. To Andy’s shock she ran toward the four men in their protective gear, not away from them. Andy scrambled to catch her, but he was too late.
She leaped directly at the man in the middle of the group with the word “CHIEF” stenciled on his biohazard suit. She was two feet above the ground and headed straight for the man’s chest. Andy wanted to shut his eyes against the impact, but something kept them open, some need to bear witness.
The dog crashed into the man at full speed… or she should have. Instead she passed through him as if he were merely a reflection of a man. From where Andy stood, he couldn’t tell which presence gave way—whether the dog somehow ceased to be flesh, blood, and bone, or the man for that one moment gave up his corporeality in deference to the dog’s desperation to get away. However it happened, the dog landed behind the crew with a graceful step. With one last, sad glance at Andy, she disappeared into the trees.
Andy finally realized his painful personal truth: if ever he had actually seen this creature, he would never do so again. The words of the old man—a being no doubt as real as the dog—echoed in his ears. “She doesn’t end here… but she does for you.”
That was when Andy’s world, and everything real or not real that kept him even slightly tethered to it, unknotted.
The chief stepped forward, oblivious to what had just happened. “Kid, you OK?”
Andy struggled to find a word while he held back tears. “Fine,” he managed to get out.
“Not a great time to be in the park, you know?” the chief said. “We need to lay some nasty shit down.”
“Leaving now.”
“You see any strays around here?” the chief asked with that resigned and weary “I already know the answer is no, but got to ask anyway” tone.
“Nope,” Andy said as he raised his face to the sky. “I thought that was all just an urban myth.”
“Starting to look that way.”
Andy stumbled off to the park entrance, his head on fire with a rage nineteen years in the making. That rage, born when he lost his parents, had matured in toxic and abusive foster homes that left him both damaged and with ridiculously few tools to make his own way in the world. It had ebbed when he met Alexa, and gushed again when he lost her. Now, without the one-eared dog that maybe wasn’t ever anything except his hope and his need, Andy’s fury was self-sustaining, with one external focal point. The only thing he had left.
The bastards would not get his dogs.
They would need to kill him first.
19
Have you ever flown in a helicopter?” the pilot asked. Sam shook her head.
The pilot went through some basic instructions about safety and then started the engine. The noise from the rotating blades became a physical presence; it shook Sam’s entire body.
“You guys OK?” the pilot shouted over the noise. He caught Sam’s eyes in his rear mirror. “You look a little green.”
“Long few days,” she answered.
“You’re not gonna hurl, are you, miss?”
“No guarantees,” she said.
“We’ll have you on the ground before you know it. No worries.”
They lifted off and Sam tried to focus on something other than her propensity to vomit in new and stressful situations. There were few options available. As they flew over the facility, she could see the police cars with their bubble lights flashing below. It would be a miracle if Beth and her dad avoided arrest, and she probably could include herself in that sentence as well.
“They’ll be fine,” Tom said. “The police know the score. Kendall and the police commissioner spoke to them.”
“Beth has a record and she isn’t the most stable person on the planet.”
“As long as she doesn’t hit anyone, they’ll leave her alone… probably.”
Sam started a sentence a few times before she got the whole thing out. “Thank you for coming up here.”
“You’re welcome. It probably would’ve been better if you had told me a few of these things along the way.” Sam thought Tom sounded more hurt than angry. “You know? The small stuff like the sick dogs in the shelter, the cholera toxin adjuvant?”
OK, maybe a little angry. “I’m sorry. But I had no reason to trust you with something like that.”
“But what—”
“And if I had told you about the dogs? What would you have done? Your job, right?” Sam pointed to the broken watch on his wrist. It was suddenly important to her that Tom understand her reasons. “For you that would have been the right thing to do. But it wasn’t my right thing.”
“Maybe. But maybe it’s more complicated than that. Maybe loyalty has something to do with it too. Maybe I also make decisions because I care about someone. Maybe if…” Tom stopped himself.
Sam suddenly had that “uh-oh” feeling she usually experienced in awkward personal situations. “What are you…?”
Tom waved the question away before Sam could finish. “Whatever your reasons, it may not change the outcome for those dogs now. It’s become politics.”
“It always was. Who gave the directive to eradicate rabies from Central Park in time for the convention? That wasn’t a public health decision.”
“No, it wasn’t. And that’s all the more reason why the governor and his people won’t back down now.”
“And what about your boss?”
“She’ll try to do the right thing… until she can’t. She won’t give up the dogs unless there’s no choice and she definitely won’t want to give them over to the governor so he can pretend he was right all along.”
“So right result
but for the wrong reason?”
“At the moment I’ll take that over a wrong result. Wouldn’t you?” Tom tapped the pilot on the shoulder. “Where are we putting down? The heliport on the West Side Highway?”
The pilot shook his head. “They just called in a change. My instructions are to touch down in Central Park—near the Great Lawn. The NYPD will meet you there. Stuff is happening.”
“You think there’s any chance this turns out OK?” Sam asked Tom.
He didn’t answer.
20
The plan to protect the dogs in the shelter worked perfectly—for precisely thirty-three minutes. That was the amount of time it took for a black FBI sedan with bubble lights flashing to arrive on-site with an order signed by the governor.
McGreary approached the police barricade and signaled to the NYPD officers on the other side of his intention to cross. Kendall nodded his permission.
“I think this is specific enough,” McGreary said, and handed Kendall the order.
Kendall read it carefully, although he had already guessed the contents. The order authorized the National Guard to “take all steps necessary or appropriate to protect the lives and health of the citizens of the State of New York pursuant to the New York and federal Constitutions by immediately confiscating all dogs currently domiciled at Finally Home Animal Shelter. This supersedes any contrary order.”
When Kendall was finished, he studied McGreary’s face and, for the first time, saw fear there. Kendall understood why.
If Kendall refused the order, as absurd as it sounded, McGreary’s men would be forced to remove him, his heavily armed men, and the occupants of the shelter before a hostile crowd chanting for (depending on which voice you listened to) more information, the protection of the dogs, or the governor’s head. The street would soon devolve into a scene out of a third-world country, with the local police on one side and the army on the other. Kendall trusted his men to keep their weapons secured and locked, but what about these Guards? Would they be able to tell friend from foe? They had no contextual experience for this. And what about that nut Owens?
Just Life Page 28