by Greg Dragon
“Wait, you’ve made drugs based on Swarmers’ blood?”
He grinned. “Righto, an entire line of immune enhancers. Flameion didn’t build a hospital in Cloudland because we needed one. In exchange for giving us jobs, I gave them access to Swarmers’ blood. Problem is, like with my vaccine, the virus in their drugs has reactivated.”
“You mean...?” She couldn’t finish her thoughts and she watched black and white cows grazing as they drove past.
“I haven’t notified them of the danger yet. I have no idea what’s activated the virus, I just know it’s a problem. A biggo problem.”
“The Hum reactivated it,” Eddie Jean answered. “People will get sick like Momma?”
“The Hum? You mean the jarring sound in my head?”
She nodded.
“The cause no longer matters once disease carriers are produced. The virus has mutated into something new and unknown. Use your head, lass. If the thousands of people on Flameion’s drugs get sick, they’ll infect family.”
Her logic followed his statements to unspoken conclusions. Nausea welled. “Pull over,” she beat on the window. “I’m going to hurl.”
He pulled off the road. She leapt out and threw up until she dry heaved. He wrapped a blanket around her shoulders and gave her bottled water. “Stay hydrated, lass. Every Delaney called to duty to control Swarm disease reacted the same. The horror passes and you’ll move into action. Any action is better than letting them nuke our town or worse turn you kids with the gloss into experiments. Our XO blood is special, and I suspect your blood is extra special. Reason I haven’t tested you is because I don’t want to butt heads with your dad. I also don’t want Flameion near your blood.”
“Because Daddy would take me and the twins away?”
“Righto.” He waved a white Honda away when the driver pulled to the side of the road to offer help.
She rinsed out her mouth and drank water. Shaking, she pulled the blanket around her. Anger had washed over her as some truths surfaced. Part of her wanted to remain silent, but she had to confront him. “You sent Momma home knowing she’s a carrier to infect my daddy and my brothers, didn’t you?”
He reacted like she slapped him. Granddad threw his hands up in the air and laughed. “I forgot how smart you are. To deny it would make you angry, and to acknowledge it will make you hate me. I’m responsible for rushing the vaccine trial. I thought she infected Kimmy while her body fought off the virus. Afterward, her blood tests were clear, and I believed the vaccine worked. I suspected a carrier state too late. In hindsight, I should’ve put Jenna down or monitored her longer. Feel whatever you wish, but get back in the truck.”
“Put her down? You mean kill her?” Her mouth went dry.
“Righto. She can’t be cured and she infects.”
“Why would she risk exposing us?”
He sighed. “I gave her placebo shots and told her she couldn’t infect anyone else.”
“You’ve kept her in the dark,” she shrieked, “for your precious experiments. I hate you!”
“Get in the truck!”
“No! You’re sick.” She stumbled to the road. Her brothers’ school was less than a mile away. She could jog to it in mere minutes and protect them from Granddad.
“If Jenna infected Michael Thomas today, then all of you were exposed this morning. The best way to help your brothers is to heal Michael Thomas.”
She winced. Sometimes Granddad was right, but she couldn’t trust him. If the twins were getting sick, they needed her now, before symptoms. Eddie Jean jogged faster.
“What will you say to Scot when he asks if you tried to heal his father?” he yelled.
She stopped and wiped tears with the blanket. Could he read her mind? No, he wanted her to think he could. According to friends, she didn’t hide her feelings very well.
He walked closer. “Scot didn’t question anything when he dived in to free your foot from the tree limbs. If he had, you’d be dead. He left his baby sister on the bank unsupervised to save you. She could’ve fallen in, but he saved you. He did CPR right in the water, remember? I, for one, will tell him you refused to help his father.” He walked back to the truck.
Tears scalded her cheeks, and her eyes searched the sky for an answer. In the end, she decided Scot gave her a second chance at living, and she couldn’t deny the same chance to his father. Afterward, she’d go to her brothers because Granddad gave her the creeps.
She dropped the blanket and walked to the truck and got in. “Is there anything else I should know about Swarm disease?”
“Lass, I hope I’m wrong, but I fear it’s gone airborne.”
Louis
Louis joined Ava in the common room. “Wow.”
She had changed into kelly-green scrubs and he relaxed. Her polite smile didn’t affect her eyes. He could see her putting on the researcher’s cold shroud and a part of him mourned.
“First stop is Microbiology,” she said, opening a door. “We don’t have time to ease you into our current work, so keep an open mind.”
“I like to dive right in,” Louis said with a wink.
She ignored him and headed down a long corridor. Ava stopped beside a door and waited for him. Louis stopped to peer through cracks in the blinds at the massive laboratory. They went into the lab, and Ava introduced him to a colleague waiting beside a microscope.
Doctor Susan Cho was short, less than five feet tall. She had an icy handshake and the palest skin he’d ever seen. “Welcome to Cloudland, Doctor Janzen. Meet Swarm disease.” She gestured to a stool. He sat down and adjusted the microscope magnification. He stared at the cells, readjusted the scope, and stared again.
He looked up at them. “I’m speechless.”
Susan said, “The virus blew me away, too. It’s been kept under the radar and hasn’t spread out of city limits. Swarm provided the basis for our immunological serums. Our products have been helpful in cancer treatments recently approved by the FDA. But lately, several local residents have had unusual blood work. We’re worried.”
“How so?” Louis asked.
Susan removed another slide from a rack and put it in his microscope. “Notice the white blood cells?”
He examined it. Something bizarre had occurred, not quite normal and not yet Swarm-like.
“How is Swarm passed?” he asked.
Susan looked at Ava.
Ava said, “The infectious agent comes up from underground tectonic plate movements and the unlucky resident inhales it. We’ve never been able to get a mist sample. No one can predict the eruptions.”
“You mean like earthquakes?”
“No.” Susan shook her head. “Locals call them swarms. They can be felt under bare feet. Sometimes the sensations sting, other times they feel like vibrations. They’re little quakes that shake us around without causing damage. The disease was named after the swarms.”
Louis could hardly speak. “A toxic gas is emitted? Why haven’t residents been evacuated?”
Ava gave a light laugh. “They take care of the rare infections internally. In other words, Cloudland’s disease is specific to Cloudland city limits. There are local myths, but the disease has never spread beyond the town.”
He couldn’t believe his ears but stayed cool. “I see. This resident,” he said, pointing at the slide, “lives inside city limits?”
He watched Susan rub her hands down her hips like she was drying them off. “That’s why I’m worried. She lives outside city limits.”
“Slightly outside,” Ava added.
“I see. Are there any secondary infections?”
“No,” Susan said. “After the gas is inhaled, the unlucky soul undergoes immediate skin reactions similar to an allergic response. Their saliva fills with the microbe—we call it the Sylph virus. Their bites become infectious in a few hours.”
Bites? Louis listened but didn’t comprehend. He waited for clarification. News stories now and then reported on people taking designer drugs and eat
ing human flesh in a blind rage, but this? Could the Sylph virus have already escaped the population through a carrier?
Ava stared up at the ceiling when she answered. “The best analogy is end-stage rabies, but Swarm takes over in hours.”
Susan nodded in agreement.
“Recovery percentages?” Louis reloaded the Swarm slide and stared at it again.
“Zero,” Ava said.
He looked up. “No treatment or cure?”
Susan scratched under her hair cap. “A few months ago we thought we’d found a treatment, but it enhanced their symptoms. The new blood work is troublesome.”
“When did you collect this sample?” Louis asked.
“A month ago, but we couldn’t follow up because the person moved.”
“She could be on vacation,” Ava said. “We’re not sure.”
Louis tried to sound blasé but failed. “Small sample size can’t be trusted.”
The women laughed. Their voices sounded hollow.
“You lost control when the patient left town. Tell me you’ve got DNA.”
Ava shook her head. “Sorry Louis, no clearance.”
Susan met his eyes. He realized her nervousness was an act to hide her fear. Louis wasn’t sure, but she also looked cornered. What the hell? He didn’t break eye contact, hoping Susan would blurt out more information.
Susan said, “Ever meet Doctor Porter Peterson?”
Louis frowned. “He sounds familiar.”
“Susan,” Ava said in a scolding tone. “Quitman has to vet guests. Maybe afterward.”
Ava dropped a hand on his shoulder. “Quitman’s quirk is he has to look people in the eyes before letting them peer down our rabbit hole.”
A phone rang and Susan walked away to answer. She didn’t speak except to say, “Yes, sir.” She came back to the microscope table looking red-faced and flustered.
Louis cocked his head, thinking. Why did the name Porter Peterson seem important? Porter Peterson...Port Peterson...Port Pete. The name bounced around in his gray matter. A niggle of information teased him, but he just couldn’t access it yet. Swarm fascination and fatigue blocked his thoughts.
Louis rubbed his forehead. He hated losing his thoughts around peers.
Susan said to Ava, “Quitman’s bringing his relatives in for observation.”
“How many?” Ava asked, sounding curt.
“He said to expect two or three patients.”
Louis noticed that Susan sucked in her lower lip and then frowned. His stomach began to ache with a familiar feeling of a new discovery. “What? For Swarm disease?”
Ava ignored him and spoke to Susan. “Be sure to take samples first thing.”
“He’s with his granddaughter.”
“So?” Ava asked. “Did he say she had symptoms?”
“He didn’t have to spell it out, Ava. I’ve worked with him for months. I didn’t sign up for this. Eddie Jean’s a teenager.”
Louis noted Susan’s left eyelid twitched. Ava, on the other hand, became animated. Her eyes gleamed and her skin flushed. Ava’s reaction reminded him of her expression during sex.
“Did she get exposed in school?” Louis asked.
Ava clasped her hands against her chest and ignored him again. “I smell a Nobel in our future, Susan.”
“You said Swarm disease was rare,” Louis said.
Ava sighed. “I may have misled you. There is more than one Swarm case here for observation, but all are in advanced stages. We’ve had a recent breakout. Don’t worry, it’s contained.”
Louis stared at her. How hideous could Swarm be? She acted like it was an impetigo outbreak. “How hopeful are you for a cure?”
“Not very,” Susan answered first.
Ava scowled, but she didn’t contradict Susan.
“Q’s granddaughter might harbor answers in her blood,” Ava pointed out. “She can lay her hands on people and heal them.” She burst into disbelieving laughter.
“I’m drawing the line, Ava. Other staff will follow.” Susan’s voice sounded firm.
“I doubt it.”
Ava’s words chilled him. “You experiment on children?” he asked.
Ava’s eyes bulged at his accusation.
Susan said, “Usually, very sick ones. Eddie Jean is different. She does heal people.”
“Doctor Cho,” Ava said in a shrill tone, “there’s no scientific proof.” Ava’s phone rang. She whispered, “Bet it’s Quitman,” and darted out the lab door.
Louis glanced back at the slide. He remembered the COGS had invited Doctor Porter Peterson to weigh in on their fringe microbe study. He was an older man with bushy cotton eyebrows that bunched together like a fuzzy eye mustache. Peterson had authored several papers on a nascent discipline called microbiomics. It turned out microbiomics was the study of human microbes in and on the human body and their relationship to diseases.
He recalled Peterson’s three recommendations if and when they ever took their findings public: One, 90% of DNA is microbial and not human. He said non-medical people were shocked to learn humans are basically super organisms made up of thousands of tiny microbes, and some have never been identified. Two, every human body has persistent individual differences in microbial ecology and it’s established in early life. Three, after the success of cracking DNA, the National Institutes of Health funded a new project called HMP at a cost of $115 million. The Human Microbe Project’s purpose: to identify, analyze, and catalog the hundreds of microflora in and on the human body. While funded by taxpayers, the results were kept secret. Doctor Peterson concluded by saying, “You’re not fringe researchers. I’d say you’re cutting edge surfers.”
Louis said to Susan, “Doctor Peterson shared with me his paper linking tic disorders in children to strep infections. The idea of a microbe at the heart of Alzheimer’s disease fascinated me. Peterson’s paper gave me the courage to search for a brain microbe in Alzheimer’s patients. I found an unusual microbe in a one-hundred-year-old brain last night, and in less than twelve hours I’m in Cloudland.”
Susan nodded. “Ava’s been tracking you.”
Tracking me? Another sick feeling fluttered in his gut. “Why?”
“You’re a leading, published researcher on Alzheimer’s disease and the only well-known one with the gene. Then, there’s your long family history, plus your father worked here.”
“You mean my family’s long tunnel of sorrow? People think Janzens are cursed, and who can blame them?”
“I didn’t mean it that way.”
Louis waved his hand smiling. “I know. Will I see Doctor Peterson on the tour?”
“No, we lost him to Swarm last week.”
Louis couldn’t speak. “I didn’t know.”
“No one does, not even his family.”
Eddie Jean
They made the drive from Fort Payne to Cloudland in a record-setting eight minutes.
Granddad parked his red Silverado behind two azalea bushes. Eddie Jean stared at the manicured lawn of her family home and wondered why he didn’t park in the driveway.
“Any chance the virus will deactivate on its own?” she asked
He cut his eyes at her. “You dense? Your mother is a carrier for what I’ve named Swarm 2. It’s more virulent than the original.”
Shaking from chills, she asked, “And me? She bit me Tuesday night.”
“Why didn’t you call me?”
Tears threatened. “What about my brothers or daddy?”
He shrugged. “Time will tell.” He climbed out and took off his lab coat.
Eddie Jean sniffed and tried to stay calm. “If the Hum activated the carrier state, maybe it will deactivate when it passes.”
He scratched his head. “Don’t hang on to hope, lass. There’s no cure for your mother.”
“I think the Hum is an old signal, a warning.”
His eyebrows fluttered around. “Warning of what?”
Her teeth chattered. “Catastrophe.”
“Well, that’s exactly what Swarm 2 will become if I don’t stamp it out.”
“It’s that bad?”
He nodded.
For the first time, she noticed his fatigue. It looked like he had smeared eye black under his eyes, like athletes do to cut glare. “Why do you think the other vaccine volunteers died and Momma didn’t?”
He climbed out. “Your touch from healing her aches and pains, or she carries a recessive gene for XO. In hindsight, I shouldn’t have used a live virus.”
“Live?” Her voice sounded squeaky. “I thought vaccines used a dead virus.”
“I erred when I believed a weakened virus would allow the body to make antibodies. I never anticipated the Sylph virus would have a stealth mode.”
“Your research methods…” She bit her lip, unable to finish.
He punched the steering wheel. “I’m doing the best I can! Swarm cases are tripling, and I can’t keep up! I gave your mother a treatment to keep her safe. I wanted to do the same with your brothers, but your father would never allow it. Should’ve done it behind his back.”
She couldn’t believe her ears. “Why? We’re your family.”
“Desperate times require risky decisions.” He pulled a travel bag from the back seat.
He didn’t have feelings. She saw the next-door neighbor peep out from behind curtains. A line of cars would exit the neighborhood once the neighbors figured out a contagious disease lurked inside the Franklin home.
“Sometimes it feels like we don’t live in America.”
“Well, you can leave,” he said, snapping out the words.
“Thanks. I’d love to.” It felt good to say the words, and she lifted her chin.
“You look like your father when you do that. Stubborn as a—”
“If he ever finds out you injected a live virus.”
“He’ll what? You should’ve called me when your mother attacked.”
“Granddad, you’re not a medical doctor. We took her to the emergency room.”