CANNIBAL KINGDOM

by John L. Campbell

  In his airborne office, Garrison Fox smiled and accepted a cup of coffee from a uniformed steward, rubbing his eyes. The day had been exhausting, like every day since he could remember, a non-stop blur of travel, speech-making, handshakes and polling reports. There was yet another event ahead tonight, a dinner with the Ohio Prosecutors Organization where Garrison would drive home his message of being tough on crime.

  He knew he should be napping in the bedroom at the nose of the aircraft, but Ohio was a critical state in the election, a swing state and still up for grabs. He needed to go over his speech to the prosecutors, making changes where necessary. His speech writers would quickly make the adjustments, but Garrison was also not averse to going off-script and speaking on the fly, something that drove the writers mad. He didn’t care. He was the one who would be held accountable for every word he spoke, not them.

  Seated on a couch on the other side of the desk was Thomas Barrow, looking rumpled and in need of a shave as usual, along with the press secretary and his National Security Advisor James Blaine. A communications officer stepped into the room to announce that both Labcoat and Cement Mixer were online, just as a pair of faces appeared in split-screen on a large, wall-mounted LCD TV. This video conference was another reason Garrison wouldn’t be napping before landing in Ohio.

  Moira Rusk’s image was on the right, the Secretary of Health and Human Services conferencing in from the CDC, and Bob Chase from Homeland Security was on the left, a balding man in his late fifties, currently seated at a table in Cement Mixer, the White House Situation Room. Bob looked fresh, but Moira’s face showed her fatigue.

  “Good evening, Mr. President,” both said.

  “Thanks for calling in,” Garrison said, tilting back in the high leather chair and sipping his coffee. “Where are we?”

  Bob Chase started. “Moira sent me her briefing video. You’ve seen it too. She’s updated me on the latest information.”

  The President gestured to the physician.

  Without preamble Moira said, “The virus continues to embed itself in organs and tissue, and so far has not given any indication that it is malignant. In the advanced cases – those people who have had it the longest, since it presented nine days ago – we are seeing a filmy sac developing around the heart, brain and base of the spinal cord. This has only been discovered during autopsies of patients who died of unrelated issues.”

  “A sac?” Garrison said, leaning forward.

  “Yes, sir,” she said. “The substance is made up of proteins with the Trident organism attached to them. The sac is not showing up in day-eight patients or earlier, but appears to develop in a matter of hours on day nine.” She frowned. “And like everything else, these sacs appear benign, not interfering with bodily functions or overall health. Patients with these sacs are just as healthy as those without.”

  “How much of the population now has these sacs, Moira?”

  “About twenty percent, as near as we can tell, Mr. President, and that number will triple by tomorrow. Trident itself remains highly virulent, and appears to have infected all but the world’s most remote populations, as near as we can tell.”

  “And we still don’t know what it is or where it came from.” It wasn’t a question.

  “Our best guess is a point of origin somewhere in Southeast Asia,” said Moira, “based on the pace at which it spreads through the body, but an exact origin remains unconfirmed. Jakarta, is most likely.”

  Garrison shuddered. He’d only recently been there, shaking hands. He rubbed his palms on his trousers without realizing it.

  “Patient Zero is a unicorn at this point,” Moira said. “As to what it is, it spreads like and has characteristics similar to Ebola, but even those descriptors are thin. It’s something new. We have no idea what it will do.”

  “If anything,” added Bob Chase.

  Now it was Garrison’s turn to frown. That a foreign organism had so aggressively expanded throughout the global population in such a short time was unsettling. The fact that it hadn’t revealed itself to be harmful was of little comfort. And now there was the added mystery of filmy sacs forming around the body’s most critical organs. Garrison was no virologist, but he understood logic. Organisms didn’t spread and then develop into new structures without a reason or goal, and that was the most chilling aspect of all. What was Trident’s objective?

  “What do the numbers look like?” he asked.

  The Sec HHS chewed at her top lip. “It’s holding steady at earlier estimates. Ten percent of people, like you, kill it off immediately. We’re confident that this is a genetic defense, and that is the angle for our inoculation work. Another ten percent, also genetically based, take a little longer to fight it off, but Trident is weakening in those people. The remaining eighty percent are hosting the organism.” She went on to explain how Trident was completely drug-resistant, its response to intense heat, and how it continued to thrive even after a host was deceased.

  Garrison drummed his fingers distractedly on the desk. “Recommendations?”

  Again, the Secretary of Homeland Security deferred to the medical professional. Moira looked at the President through the video link and said, “I’m recommending full implementation of the National Response Plan.”

  The President leaned back, even though he’d sensed it coming. The implications to the country if the full NRP were implemented were more than serious, potentially devastating. They went beyond anything the U.S. had ever faced from natural disaster, and in fact the only thing more serious would be if the nation went to war with another superpower.

  Medical experts in the United States defined a pandemic as, An epidemic of infectious disease that has spread through human populations across a large region, continents or even worldwide. Trident fit that description, except for the disease part. Not technically, that was, because a disease was a disorder with specific symptoms, but it was right on the cusp of the definition. The NRP was a three-part national security strategy, much of which was continuously in effect. It was the third step that they were really discussing.

  The Director of Homeland Security was responsible for running the National Response Plan, but it was the Secretary of Health and Human Services who coordinated medically and advised. Other agencies would provide plans and help with decision-making, with the entire process chaired by the White House. In the end, the final green light had to be given by the President.

  The model for the NRP was based upon influenza outbreaks, with classical disease attack rates at around thirty percent, forty percent among school-age children. In such an outbreak, those most at risk for fatality were infants, pregnant women, the elderly and those with chronic medical conditions. With a typical influenza strain, those infected would, on average, infect ten other people. The epidemic would last between six and eight weeks in affected communities.

  Some strains were more deadly, such as the outbreak of Spanish Flu (now called H1N1) in 1918 that claimed around a hundred million lives, five percent of the world’s population at the time. The NRP assumed worst case scenarios like that.

  The three-part strategy consisted first of Preparedness and Communication; creating a national stockpile of anti-viral drugs, between twenty and seventy-five million doses. Pre-positioning of medical and non-medical supplies (to provide pop-up field hospitals) was also part of the first step, as well as maintaining public confidence. This last usually came down to education and media spots to assure the American people that their government had a plan and would move quickly to protect them.

  At the moment there was equipment stored across the country, and the anti-viral stockpile was in place and being distributed, for what little good it was doing. Public confidence in the government’s ability to deal with a massive crisis was something else entirely, support that had been waning year after year as Americans became increasingly jaded and skeptical. The FEMA response to Katrina hadn’t helped matters, and continued to be the event people pointed to when discussing governme
nt incompetence in the face of disaster.

  The second part of the plan was Bio-surveillance and Detection, elements also already in place. Commonly referred-to as hospital surveillance, this part of the program was a cooperative effort not only domestically but abroad, where physicians worldwide constantly engaged in screening, monitoring and sharing information. In a “normal” pandemic, this advance warning would help slow the spread of disease to the United States. It was this screening and communication that had identified Trident in the first place. Had there been a vaccination against the organism, its implementation would have fallen under this part of the plan.

  Garrison’s coffee was now getting cold on his desk. “Did I hear you correctly, Moira?”

  “Yes you did, Mr. President.”

  Bob Chase jumped in. “With all due respect to Dr. Rusk, I can’t support this course of action at this time, Mr. President. Trident hasn’t done anything.”

  “I’m convinced it will,” Moira said. “It’s acting viral in every way, it’s highly contagious and aggressive, and it has done something. It has infected almost every living soul on the planet – and continues to grow even in the deceased – and now we have these sac-like growths in critical areas.”

  “Which you can’t say pose a threat,” said the Homeland director. “Despite how it acts, you can’t tell us it’s medically harmful.”

  “Bob,” said Moira, “you don’t have to be a doctor to know that the train heading toward you will be destructive to your body if you’re still standing on the tracks when it gets there.” She sighed. “I’ve been a physician for a long time. I recognize a killer when I see one, no matter how it’s masquerading.”

  “It hasn’t killed anyone,” said Bob Chase.

  The President held up his hand to stop the back-and-forth. His advisors were intelligent, well-intentioned professionals, but they were human. What Moira was saying had them scared, and it wasn’t simply the idea of unknown disease effects or global pandemic that was putting them on edge. Implementing phase three of the NRP was frightening all on its own.

  Response and Containment. This phase went into action once the genie was out of the bottle. It was designed to mitigate disease, suffering and death, maintain a functional health care system infrastructure and ensure that critical services could be provided to the public; essential commodities such as gas, food, medical assistance and chlorine water purification. It would also serve to sustain the country’s power infrastructure and lessen the financial impact of a widespread outbreak.

  It sounded orderly and comprehensive on paper. In reality it was merely a lesser chaos.

  The opening moves were benign; public notices to drive frequent hand-washing, encouraging social distancing and providing both surgical masks and Latex gloves to the population. Then the U.S. would inform all foreign governments that it was executing the NRP in order to ensure societal continuity and national defense.

  The United States would move to DEFCON 3.

  After that, it got really messy. The President would order price-freezing and close the stock market indefinitely. He would order a stop to all domestic and international travel, call up and federalize all National Guard units, declare a state of martial law and close the borders. Those citizens determined to be sick would be isolated, and those not yet sick would be quarantined.

  Garrison looked out the window as the last hint of the sun was replaced by a rapidly deepening night. He knew the plan. Every President did.

  Widespread contagion and a fully implemented NRP would lead to school closures, workforce shortages, a breakdown in public order and civil disobedience. Illness within their own ranks coupled with enforcing travel restrictions and dealing with civil unrest would strain local law enforcement agencies to the breaking point, and putting troops in the streets was bound to result in tragedies all over the country, no matter how disciplined the unit. The economy would take a nose dive, and there would be a national panic. And that was all just here at home.

  The global economy would take a hit, probably a crippling one, given the complex and interconnected nature of international trade. America’s rivals might take advantage of the situation to expand into contested areas (like the South China Sea or the Middle East) and enemies might see the moment of weakness as the perfect opportunity to strike at the hated western devil.

  If only the NRP could be implemented in selective bits and pieces. Garrison knew it was a naïve and juvenile thought. For the plan to work, to stop a pandemic before it could do too much damage, there could be no half measures. You had to be all-in.

  “Mr. President,” Moira said from the screen, “I fully understand the impact of my recommendation. I don’t make it lightly, and I wouldn’t make it at all if I didn’t believe that Trident is a nightmare, the proportions of which we have never seen.” The doctor surprised even herself at the dramatic delivery. She was a controlled, thoughtful scientist not given to emotional commentary. She didn’t correct herself, however.

  “And I say it’s still too early, Mr. President,” said Bob Chase.

  If there had been even a single case of symptoms, Garrison thought, just one indication that Trident was hostile, he would pull the trigger on the NRP without a second thought. He trusted Moira Rusk, and her analogy of a train coming down the tracks had resonated with him. But could he throw his country into turmoil over a theory, no matter how sound the reasoning? And with that same logic, what disaster might be approaching – a potentially avoidable one – if he did nothing? His number one priority as President of the United States, despite what anyone else might think, was protecting her citizens. Did he do that by executing a plan designed to prevent widespread disease and death? Or did he better protect them by not turning their world upside-down with a devastating series of events to defend against something that might not even come to pass? Better safe than sorry applied in both cases.

  “Tell me what you’re doing about this, Moira.”

  “Mr. President, this is the only thing CDC is working on right now. We’re in constant contact with researchers and physicians around the globe, sharing information. Here in Atlanta we have more than a hundred voluntary test subjects being monitored twenty-four-seven. It’s the same around the country.

  The President’s frown deepened and he was silent for a long moment. “I can’t approve it, not without more evidence of a threat. Find it for me, Moira. I want updates from you every six hours, regardless of the time, and sooner if anything breaks.”

  “Yes, Mr. President.”

  Garrison pointed at his Chief of Staff, seated on a sofa. “Set up a conference in thirty minutes, Tommy. I want the Joint Chiefs, Sec Def, Sec State and FEMA on the call.” He looked at his Homeland Security director’s image. “Bob, we’re going to prep with the assumption that Dr. Rusk and her team is going to confirm her theory. If that happens I want to move fast and put phase three into action immediately. You’ll need to be on that call as well.”

  “Yes, Mr. President,” said Bob Chase, and the signal to CDC and the Situation Room cut off.

  Garrison looked at Tommy Barrow and his National Security Advisor. “God help us if she’s right.”

  The leak came not from anyone on the video conference, not from the Situation Room or Air Force One. It was the IT tech at CDC who had set up the supposedly secure call for Dr. Rusk. He had stayed on the line, eavesdropping. He supposed he was breaking one federal law or another by doing it, but how often did a person get to actually hear a private conversation with the President of the United States?

  What he heard, however, rattled him so badly that as soon as the conference was over he started making calls.

  Within hours the media was spinning. Talking heads told the world that sources were claiming that medical experts close to the President believed Trident was dangerous, and were being ignored. They spoke of discord within the White House and Garrison Fox’s refusal to implement national strategies that would protect the American public. Some accused the P
resident of playing politics, trying to conceal the risk and failing to act so as not to disrupt the final weeks of a re-election campaign. The most frightening aspects of the NRP were put up on screen in bullet points, driving the fear factor in order to ensure viewers and listeners stay tuned. Congress responded by demanding answers, and Garrison’s democratic opponent immediately began holding press conferences to hammer at the idea that the country needed a leader who was not self-serving and would put their best interests first.

  None of it would matter in the end. Trident was less than twenty-four hours away from revealing its true nature to the world.

  OUTBREAK

  -11-

  SOO YIM

  Over the Pacific – October 28

  Trans Pacific Air flight two-seven-two Heavy flew at five hundred forty mph, 39,000 feet above the South Pacific headed for Hawaii, with Sydney, Australia two hours behind it. The passengers had settled in for the long flight and were quiet, awaiting the first round of beverage service. In the galley up front between First Class and the cockpit, a male flight attendant was filling carafes with coffee.

  Soo Yim should have been helping him, but instead she sat on the jump seat near the aircraft’s main door, rubbing her arms. She’d been having the chills for almost an hour now, and a headache was throbbing at the base of her skull. She was miserable and knew she was getting sick. The last time had been eight months ago, a bronchial infection that kept her out of work for five days and used up a large portion of her paid sick time. Illness was an occupational hazard for flight attendants, stuck in a sealed tube for hours with so many people, exposed to every cough and sneeze, every surface they touched. Only a rare few could work in the airline industry and not get sick at least once a year. And Soo Yim hated being sick. She sat and stared at the fiberglass divider between her and First Class.