Mortal Crimes 2

by Various Authors

  Canned hunts. Donna understood all too well. Legal, yes, in North Dakota, with none of the prohibitions adopted by more enlightened states. Small enclosures, high fences and release of animals right in front of hunters were all acceptable practices. No wonder Triple E had opted to settle here. She bristled at the “misguided sense of justice” remark, but swallowed her anger, unwilling to jeopardize an opportunity to legally punish this corporation if they could find any evidence VTSE started here and Triple E deliberately hid knowledge of it. Prosecution that affected the corporate wallet was the sweetest revenge that could be enacted upon a company. Anything less was simply spitting into its soup.

  As if sensing Donna’s anger, Walt continued, “Make no mistake that what we’re doing is legal here. Endangered animals raised in captivity are property. We can sell them or shoot them at our pleasure so long as whatever we do, we do humanely. You may not like what we’re doing, the same as I don’t like that major soda manufacturers are going into third-world nations and exploiting their water supplies to bottle a product with no nutritional value that only contributes to obesity, which in turn raises corporate taxes to pay for increased medical costs. Ethics and the law clash all the time. We’ve learned we can’t regulate ethics simply because my ethical bounds are not what yours are.”

  The irony wasn’t lost on Walt that what he was launching into was basically the same speech he’d been preparing to combat criticism when they opened the museum to the public in a few months.

  “Consider that we’re doing the same work conservationists are. Preserving species that would otherwise be lost to the world. Species that their native habitat no longer supports. Look at the magnificent failures of recent efforts: wolves reintroduced to Yellowstone exterminated by the locals, gorilla populations in Burundi poached into extinction. Conservationists are turning in desperation to zoos to sustain populations that can no longer be sustained in the wild. To what end are these animals being kept, then, except for our benefit? How is that ethical? How does that help the species? It’s not like the native habitats are ever going to be reclaimed. Maybe a few acres here or there, but in the long run, once humans have overrun an area, it’s not ever going to be fit for some species again. Naturalists are fooling themselves to think otherwise.

  “Our genetics program exists to produce the best specimens of endangered species possible. The ultimate goal of nature is reproduction, and our program ensures the most vigorous animals have the chance to reproduce. A lot. No different than how ranchers cultivate their herds. One prime bull may sire hundreds of offspring through artificial insemination. A prime milk cow may have her eggs harvested, fertilized and implanted in dozens of other heifers, and so be mother to ten times the number of offspring she would naturally be able to produce.

  “Does anyone bat an eye at the profit being made from these activities in an industry that survives on slaughter? May I speculate that you, Dr. Bailey—yes, I do know who you are—even participate in these practices and profit from them, too? What we’re doing is little different. We ensure we have plenty of robust, genetically diverse stock to produce future generations. We harvest sperm and eggs during the animals’ reproductive prime, and mix them together to produce viable zygotes that eventually become new candidates for our better-than-natural selection process. Then we ensure populations are kept in check by eliminating the animals no longer needed for reproduction. And we make a profit.

  “Conventional conservation efforts are a drain on the societies in which they operate. The Triple E model is self-sustaining and profitable. Yet the results are the same. Can you truly argue with the process?”

  Standing next to Donna, Mike could sense her nearly palpable tension, suitably impressed at how collected she still managed to appear. Instinctively, he knew her outward composure was a hard-won battle. He’d never really given much consideration to canned hunts himself. At first blush, he found them distasteful and somewhat cowardly. But the practical side of him acknowledged that hunters would hunt regardless, and raising animals expressly for the purpose of being killed for sport was, as Walt intimated, little different than raising them to feed a country that exploited livestock far beyond actual need. In any case, he wasn’t here to pass judgment on the business model, but to discover what, if any, role Triple E had in the influence of the advancing pandemic.

  “Do you currently have hunters on the property?” Mike asked.

  “About 20, yes. None of them happy about being forcibly kept here, I might add. But we’re doing our best to sweeten their stay.”

  “They’re actively hunting then?”

  “We have a large inventory to dispose of in the next ten days. Our schedule is very aggressive. I’ll also need to insist that the hunters and hunt ranges are off limits. Our clients have paid good money to be here and there’s absolutely no reason for the CDC to interfere with the shoots. The hunts are, after all, in compliance with the Guards’ methods for destroying any suspect animals.”

  Mike knew he and Donna were on shaky ground anyway as they had little more than circumstantial evidence in their corner for being here at all. He made a show of compromise by politely agreeing to Walt’s restrictions, though both parties realized they were indulging each other for the sake of politics and little else.

  But Walt, having topped the $2.4 billion mark in the auction for his company’s research, was feeling magnanimous at the moment. So much so that he even waved Sam on after he’d collected Mike and Donna’s phones, and offered to show the CDC representative and the vet around himself.

  As they made their way around the main building, where they’d met Helen Marsh the last time they were here, and down to the animal enclosures, Walt told them, “We liken our facility standards to those of this country’s better zoos. We have separate breeding pens and nurseries and ranges for each species we keep. What we can provide our animals that the average zoo cannot is a more stress-free environment. Our animals are not on constant display and they are free to interact with their caregivers as much or as little as they want after they are turned out from the nursery. I’m sure you’ll understand that, just like a zoo limits traffic through their nurseries, we do the same here. Not just for the health of the animals, as that is what’s in question now, of course, but because we conduct classified research for enhancing our breeding programs. For that same reason, we won’t be visiting the labs or the pens where we implant the zygotes we produce. But I can show you the maternity ward, as we call it, if you’ll step through here.”

  Walt held the door open to a spacious barn with several reinforced stalls, each filled with thick straw and each under the surveillance of a controllable camera. Only a handful of the stalls held occupants; the rest were clean and waiting, like unoccupied rooms in a hotel. A separate room near the door held medical and cleaning supplies, a deep box freezer and a large refrigerator. To Donna’s surprise, the barn smelled decidedly of life, not antisepsis, despite the scrupulous cleanings it obviously received. She wondered if the abundance of straw helped mask the sterile scent of disinfectants, making it feel more like the calving barns she was used to than the research labs and clinics of her university days.

  If the first impression Walt was wanting to leave was that the staff cared for the comfort and well-being of the animals and treated them with the respect living, breathing individuals deserved and not simply as commodities, he had certainly succeeded in Donna’s eyes.

  She and Mike walked down the center aisle, peering through the thick bars at the full-bellied surrogates. Two Bengal tigers and a grizzly paced their confines in restless anticipation, while a brown bear curled in the straw, panting heavily as delivery time approached. Donna paused outside a stall where a gray wolf lay outstretched, surrounded by a large litter of suckling pups.

  Two of the pups caught her immediate attention. Lighter in color than their siblings, they were also larger and stockier in build, certainly destined to be pack leaders if they weren’t so underweight for their size. On
closer observation, Donna saw why. Just like dozens of calves she’d recently seen, these two pups were nosing ineffectually at their mother, either unable to find her milk-swollen teats or unable to figure out how to suckle. Two medium-sized, darker-furred pups also seemed to be having difficulty nursing despite the bitch’s frequent nuzzling and encouragement. And one of two small cinnamon-colored pups lay nearly inert under the squirming bodies of its siblings.

  “Those two reddish pups,” Walt said, “are red wolves. Extinct in the wild as of three years ago. Losing those two is not just a financial loss for us, but a critical loss for the survival of its species. All we can do is harvest cells now and try to clone them later—still a tricky process. If they were old enough, we would collect ova or sperm, encourage fertilization and freeze the resulting zygotes for later implantation into something like this gray wolf mother once the threat of VTSE has passed. That’s how we got those pups in the first place.

  “We’re as concerned about species survival as you are. Like I said, we’re not the bad guys.”

  “And those two big pups,” Donna pointed in their direction, “what are they? Russian wolves?”

  It wasn’t Donna’s question or Walt’s answer—“No, just naturally big boys”—that drew Mike’s attention, but the uncomfortable pause between them. It was, he thought, entirely possible that the CEO of a multimillion dollar company would not immediately know what types of pups a wolf just whelped. But he didn’t really even look at the pups before he answered. It was as if he already knew but was trying to find a believable excuse for not saying what he knew. Which made Mike willing to bet those pups weren’t normal gray wolves. What they were was still a mystery, though. Hybrids? The result of gene splicing? Genetically enhanced specimens specifically engineered for bigger body size? That would make sense if the ultimate goal was a trophy animal. But why would that be such a secret? Researchers for the livestock industry had been using techniques to produce heavier, faster-growing animals now for decades. It wasn’t like he and Donna were asking Walt to spill the secrets of any patented research.

  But he’d have to continue his speculations later; Walt was ushering them out of this low-slung barn and into a second barn with vaulted ceilings and steel-railed stalls strong enough to hold an elephant. Three elephants, actually, by Mike’s count, plus two rhinoceroses. Having a soft spot for saucer eyes and oversized ears, Mike was quite disappointed to not see any young.

  “We place the mothers and their calves in a nursery herd within a couple of days of birth since the calves are usually walking well by then,” Walt explained. “The mothers all cooperate to care for the young, and we encourage that native instinct. Mainly because it makes our jobs easier. But I’m afraid it also means you’ll only get to see these three plus a few teenage bulls. Enough, I’m sure, to see that overall, yes, we do have several animals in varying stages of this new prionic disease, and to assure you that they’re being well cared for in advance of their—”

  The sound of a shotgun blast ricocheted from one of the hunting ranges. A distant whoop of excitement followed.

  Walt smiled. “Couldn’t have asked for better timing. I think that will reassure you we are carrying out the recommendations of the CDC ahead of being asked, yet on a timescale that provides us the most profitability. I’m not sure what more you want here.”

  And suddenly Mike knew what it was about the CEO’s too-pat spiel that didn’t follow logically. “You’re hunting down all your game, you say?”

  “We’ve made the decision to dispose of all our inventory in light of the current crisis, yes.”

  “And you have 20 hunters here to accomplish that?”

  “We have more scheduled to arrive once the ban on air travel lifts. Assuming the airport opens again soon, the Triple E staff should all be out of a job within the next ten days.”

  “But how did you know?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “How did you know you’d be disposing of all your inventory, as you put it? Even privileged clients need lead time to arrange their schedules. Twenty people were already here when the president made his speech. What was it that prompted you to arrange all this beforehand?”

  “I assure you, Mr. Shafer, you are looking for motive where none exists. We are simply offering our current—rather wealthy—clients the opportunity to get a little more for their money while they’re already here. There is nothing prophetic about the redirect we’ve made in the last couple of days.”

  “That’s a lie, Mr. Thurman.”

  Light from the open door framed Sylvia Decker as she snapped a picture of Walt and his guests with her contraband camera. Unable to get any scoop from her fellow hunters and unable to gain access to any of the animals, her anticipated expose, up until now, had been in imminent trouble. Not to mention she’d been finding the incessant conversations about hunting—from past experiences to the merits of the different brands of tools of the trade—a bit tedious. Following Walt and his guests had given her a small thrill—and being able to call Walt out in a lie was about to give her failing expose the resuscitation it needed.

  “You’re with the government, aren’t you?” she asked Mike. “That’s what I overheard.”

  “The CDC. Why?”

  “Because Triple E Enterprises sent out invitations for a special hunting event that they billed ‘The Last Shot’ more than a month ago. They must have known that far back they needed to get rid of their inventory.”

  Walt spread his hands. “Coincidence, nothing more.”

  “Pretty lucky for you, wouldn’t you say?” Mike asked.

  “The business world runs as much on luck as on skill. It’s simply a matter of seizing opportunity and capitalizing on coincidence. We were doing a runup to taking the company public, that’s why all the hype.”

  “So a tiger escapes, livestock become infected and you schedule a special hunt to what, garner publicity? I don’t see the media sharks swarming. Surely you sent a press release.”

  “We postponed going public.”

  “Another coincidence?”

  “A matter of business strategy, which I am not discussing.”

  “How about Sector C?” Sylvia asked. “Are you discussing that?”

  Walt shrugged. “A group of specialty animals. They have no bearing on why the CDC is here. They’re concerned about a common tiger.”

  “We’re concerned about the spread of the disease, whether your tiger was Patient Zero or not,” Mike reminded him before turning to Sylvia. “What kind of specialty animals?’

  “That’s the thing. It’s so secret, even I don’t know and I’m supposed to be hunting there tomorrow. Some kind of elephant they think is worth 1.1 million dollars—and that’s the discount price.”

  “Our fees are all-inclusive,” Walt pointed out, “and cover taxidermy costs, storage and shipping.”

  “And if I elect to ship my elephant off to a zoo somewhere instead, do your fees cover that?”

  “I’m afraid taking a live animal off this compound isn’t possible.”

  “Well, of course not now. But I think you had to know at least five or six weeks ago that they’re diseased and that’s why you slashed the cost on them. Who’s going to pay top dollar for sick animals?”

  “My God.” Donna’s voice trembled. “You’re going to stuff these animals and then ship them out? What if the disease doesn’t stop with the death of its host? You can’t kill a prion—how do you intend to denature it?”

  “I was under the impression you have to ingest it for it to infect you,” Walt said.

  “But if there’s dried saliva or blood or even urine on the skin, you could pick up the proteins just moving the trophy or touching it. Then, your dog licks your hand or you feed your baby—”

  “That’s speculation on your part. And a lot of coincidence needed to set up just the right scenario. We can take this too far, you know. What if a mouse cleans up grain that spills out of a cow’s mouth then somehow winds up in a shippin
g crate bound for Korea, gets eaten by a dog, then some family eats the dog? Due diligence has to be practiced, of course, but to mitigate every possible contingency would bring travel, commerce and eventually the whole global economy to a screeching halt. That’s just not practical. We’ll take prudent care, but to ban us from shipping mounted animals on the basis they might be able to transmit disease in an improbable series of events is just plain ridiculous.”

  “About those specialty animals in Sector C… “ Mike reminded him.

  “They are bioengineered specimens Triple E is looking to patent and are outside the scope of your investigation. The tiger you found came out of Sector B—our Endangered group.”

  “And there’s no integration of animals, ever? The animals in Sector C have different surrogates than those in your B Sector?”

  “No, they have the same surrogates. And they stay together in the nursery till they are separated as adolescents. You’ll note your tiger is an adult, though. Two or three years old, I believe I was told.”

  “But if VTSE did originate here and you’re playing with biogenetics, what’s to say that it didn’t appear as a genetic mutation first and spread from there?”

  “Are you inferring we may have created this disease? We deal with mammalian genotypes, not individual strands of proteins. When I say we’ve bioengineered some animals, I’m referring to producing stable, healthy zygotes that carry favorable, normal characteristics. I’m not talking gene manipulation that produces anomalies like pigs with wings.”

  “My elephant, then” Sylvia said. “What makes it worth twice as much as, say, an endangered Asian elephant?”

  “I would have to know which particular animal was matched with you, Ms. Decker—“

  “No, you wouldn’t, Mr. Thurman. I’m sure you can tell me in general what makes the animals in Sector C so special if they are only produced with normal and favorable characteristics. I’m going to find out tomorrow anyway.”