Plague

CHAPTER 20

Samantha Bower sat in a small gray room the TSA used as a holding cell. There were no windows and no decorations. Just a gray table and two gray chairs. No agents from the FBI or the TSA came in however. She guessed she was in there for over an hour before there was a knock on the door and Ralph Wilson appeared with two police officers. He had a knowing grin on his face and said, “Let’s go, jail bird. You can get your bike later.”

They stayed silent until they were outside and the two officers had returned to their cruiser. A cab waited for them on the curb and they climbed in. Wilson told the driver to take them to Queen’s Medical.

“They said you assaulted a TSA agent.”

“I didn’t assault her. I just tried to push my way past her.”

“Pushing is assault.” He smiled at her. “I was arrested once in Texas for confining a woman with pneumonic plague to a hospital room and locking the door. Sometimes fighting for the greater good means you’re going to get into some hot water.”

He leaned back in the seat and pulled out a pipe. He never smoked it, as he had quit years ago, but the feel of it in his mouth, Sam knew from late night conversation, made him feel as if he were in his youth again.

“They won’t be pursuing charges,” he said.

“Did she make it on the plane?”

“Yes. They’re in the air right now. The FBI’s agreed to help us and they’re grounding the plane. But it’s too late for the passengers. Everyone will have to be quarantined.” He stared out the window. “We’ve had forty-one admittees since this morning.”

Sam nodded, as if expecting news like that. “The hospital doesn’t have any more space. I scouted out a rec center nearby. We can rent the gymnasium and just buy cots. Ralph, we need to ground all the flights coming and going. We need to let the public know this isn’t the swine flu or a head cold.”

“I know,” he said, keeping his eyes glued to the passing buildings. “I never thought I would experience something like this.”

They arrived at Queen’s Medical and Sam could see there was a heavier military presence than even a few hours ago. Jeeps were parked in most of the handicap and expectant mother spaces and several MPs stood at every entrance and exit.

They walked into a ghost town. The staff was not there anymore. Wilson informed her that several of the receptionists and orderlies had come down with symptoms. Sam immediately went up to the sixth floor. A few nurses were walking around, going from room to room and helping where they could. Now they were in full gear, with facemasks, thick rubber gloves, and booties. The barriers she had asked for were now up and no one was touching any of the patients.

She saw Duncan Adams walk out of a room. He was staring at the floor, lost in thought as he bit his lower lip.

“Hi,” he said as he looked up.

“Hi. How’s it looking?”

“Incubation period is about seven days, not twelve like it should be. This virus is replicating faster than normal smallpox. I’ve sent some tissues back to USAMRIID. I need to see what we’re dealing with. I’m afraid I’ll have to cancel dinner tonight. I’m going to be on a plane back to Maryland.”

“To tell you the truth I don’t feel much like eating right now.”

Sam noticed a nurse near the reception area walk to a large white board. She erased two names and added six others. It was a death board, though it wasn’t officially called that. They kept track of the patients and erased the names of those that died. Sam ran down the list: not a single one that had been here when she first came to Hawaii was still alive. A small box in the corner said, SURVIVORS. It was empty.

“I’ll be back in a couple days,” Duncan said. “I’d like to take you to dinner then.”

“I’m sorry, Duncan. I just can’t think about that right now.”

“You haven’t handled too many of these, have you?”

“Too many of what?”

“Outbreaks of hot agents. Most people don’t realize that outbreaks like this are quite common in Africa and India, South Asia, places with large numbers of poor that are packed tightly together. In the Congo, Ebola makes an appearance every day. It just appears, out of nowhere. It’ll kill a few hundred people, perhaps cause a hospital to be shut down, and then it disappears as the infected population dies off. I’m always sent to those so I may not have the right perspective on this situation. Sorry if I seem insensitive, but I’ve seen so much of this, I’ve been a little desensitized.”

“You weren’t insensitive. I just have a lot taking up my brain’s processing power right now. So how many outbreaks have you handled?”

“At least fifty. One of the worst was in Kinshasa. A maternity ward had been infected with bubonic plague. They had no antibiotics so I had to fly them in but it took two weeks to get there. It was the worst two weeks of my life.”

“I bet,” she said, now purposely averting her gaze from the death board she’d been staring at.

“So what are you going to do now?”

“I’m setting up a new patient center in the rec center a few blocks away. The hospital doesn’t have the capacity to hold all these people. Then I’m going to recruit staff from all the hospitals to work it.”

“Can I make a recommendation without sounding like an ass? Don’t recruit people. If they feel it’s part of their job to risk their lives, they won’t do it. Ask for volunteers. Once a few of them volunteer, some of the others will be shamed into it.”

“Dr. Bower.”

Sam turned to see Jerry Amoy run up to her.

“Dr. Bower, I need you to look at something right away. Follow me. Dr. Adams, you should come to. Please suit up first.”

They ran to the locker rooms and dressed, grabbing fresh facemasks and booties from stations set up in the corridor. They followed Amoy down the hall to the last room and entered. The man in the hospital bed didn’t appear human.

He was covered in maculopapular rashes from head to toe, and blisters had formed on his skin in every inch of available space. The blisters were raised, filled with fluid, and his skin appeared like it had thousands of pebbles jammed underneath it.

“Haven’t seen this before,” Jerry Amoy said. “He’s the first with the blisters. He’s also blind. The blisters have formed on his retinas and caused scarring. This isn’t the same disease we were seeing; this is classic smallpox.”

Sam wanted to step closer but her body didn’t allow it. A primordial aversion to sickness and death bubbled within her and prevented her from taking those few steps over to the side of the bed. But will is stronger than instinct. She forced herself over to look at the blisters.

There was no hemorrhaging underneath the dermis causing the characteristic charred appearance of the other patients.

“Is it a mutation in the virus?” Amoy said.

“I doubt it,” Sam replied. “We’d be seeing a lot more of it. It might be a new strain, appearing in the population at the same time.”

“That’s super unlikely,” Duncan said. “I’ve read that some patients are resistant to black pox. His body might have fought it off and just been left with…this.”

Samantha leaned down close to the man’s face. She felt her heart pounding and her breaths were inadvertently quick and shallow. “Can you hear me?” she said.

The man didn’t respond. His mouth was agape and his eyes closed, the lids covered with thick, bubbly blisters.

He suddenly shot up and gasped for breath as he began to writhe. She jumped back, into Duncan, as Amoy called some staff. They held the man down and injected a sedative.

“You okay?” Duncan asked.

Sam pulled away from him and straightened her hair, taking a deep breath. “Just to be on the safe side,” she said, “we need smallpox vaccinations.”

Duncan said, “We ordered thousands the second we heard. They’re not here yet but I’m sure they will be. It may be enough to inoculate against the black pox as well.”

Sam walked toward the door and stepped out into the corridor. “That death board has doubled from this morning. If this agent hits its tipping point, there’ll be no one left to inoculate. We need to get those vaccinations here as fast as possible.”