The next morning was sunny. A bright blue sky reflected off the hundreds of windows on the Canadian Science Centre for Human and Animal Health, which contained the relatively new National Microbiology lab. Kate walked across the street, the only thing in her stomach a complimentary hotel coffee and a feeling of unease. Kate entered through the front doors of the building and handed over the ID Judy had given her. Kate waited as the man behind the desk processed her information.
She felt a moment of acute panic, like she needed to explain how she was really an ER physician, that this was only the second time she’d consulted with the RCMP. That it was temporary. That her girlfriend had been worried about Kate taking on this assignment. That she didn’t want to admit she was struggling. That there was a small possibility Andy had been right from the very beginning.
The man behind the desk handed Kate back her ID, saying Dr. Levesque would be down momentarily. Kate took the few minutes to pull herself together, looking around the lobby at the colourful public service posters on vaccinations, safe food handling practices, outbreak preparedness, and hand washing. By the time she heard her name being called, Kate felt in control of herself again.
Dr. Louise Levesque was a tiny wisp of a woman, with long grey hair pulled back to reveal a broad forehead, bright blue eyes, and a genuine smile of delight.
“Dr. Morrison, it is very nice to meet you. How are you?” she said in her thick French-Canadian accent.
“Fine, thank you,” Kate replied, willing herself to make it true.
After signing Kate in and handing her a visitor’s badge, Dr. Levesque walked very quickly down several hallways, leaving the brightly lit visitors entrance behind and moving into what Kate suspected was the centre of the building.
“It is very rude of me not to give you the whole tour, the Canadian Science Centre for Human and Animal Health is a fascinating place. But we have such a small amount of time before you are to return to BC, we must make the most of it, yes?”
“Yes. I want to know everything you know about this virus.”
The woman smiled again. “Curiosity is a most useful tool.”
Dr. Levesque used her passkey to unlock a set of heavy frosted glass doors, the words Viral Disease Division stencilled in a thick, dark font. “We have brought the HV1A-CS virus to the Viral Disease Division. There was an argument early on about whether or not it should be here or in the Influenza and Respiratory Division, but viral disease won out. They usually do these days,” she added, with a smile.
A long, segmented desk bisected the conference room they entered. A man and two women, all in in lab coats, sat talking. They all looked up as Kate and Dr. Levesque walked in. Kate noted one of the faces looked friendly, one serious, and one disgruntled. Dr. Levesque introduced them to Kate, who only remembered that the serious woman’s name was Rayna and the grumpy guy reminded her strongly of Jack. He had curly hair, was unkempt, and constantly fiddled with his laptop.
“Dr. Morrison,” Dr. Levesque began, “we’d like to go over our initial results in terms of viral pathogenesis, our hypothesis for viral replication, life cycle, and so on. I realize that as a physician you are more used to looking at patients on a macro level, meaning the onset and progression of symptoms, the broader implications of medical history and drug interactions on illness. So, while I imagine you are eager to put what we have in context of your patients, I would like to encourage you to think micro for the next few hours, try to forget the effects this virus has on your patient and instead think cellular, the effects that one small virus has on a host cell.”
Kate looked doubtfully at Dr. Levesque, unsure if she would be able to clear her mind of the chest x-rays, the autopsy results, the picture of Harris Trenholm gasping into his O2 mask. “I’ll try,” Kate said.
“Excellent,” Dr. Levesque said happily. “I truly think once we can begin to understand this virus on a cellular level, it will make the symptoms, the progression, and hopefully the treatment make more sense.”
“Okay, let’s get started,” Kate said, leaning forwards in her chair, attempting to push thoughts of Hidden Valley out of her head.
“Who’s up for a game of Go Fish?” Grumpy Jack asked, tapping at the mouse pad on his laptop and looking around.
“I’m in,” the not-serious woman with dirty-blond hair said, squinting her eyes in mock challenge at Grumpy Jack.
Kate saw Dr. Levesque shaking her head. “We could at least attempt to make a positive professional impression upon Dr. Morrison,” she murmured. “The NML does have a worldwide reputation to maintain.”
“Come on, Dr. Lou, we’ll still get all the information across but in half the time and in a much more entertaining format.” He sat back and folded his hands innocently across his stomach. “Unless you believe our west-coast neighbour here can’t hack the content?”
Dr. Levesque looked at Kate with apologetic eyes. “Dr. Morrison, do you have any idea why the most brilliant minds are also the most uncooperative?”
Kate grinned in response, feeling a bit of the pressure relieved in the midst of the banter. These were people she understood.
“Okay, I’ll play the hantavirus hand and Nicole, you play the influenza A hand,” Grumpy Jack said, without waiting for the go-ahead from his supervisor. Kate saw Dr. Levesque throw up her hands in surrender and take her seat.
“Do you have a single strand?” Grumpy Jack challenged the blond woman, Nicole.
“Yes.”
“Point one for me. Do you have RNA?”
“Yes.”
“How about a Class 5 on Balty’s Classification System?”
“Yep.”
“And do you have a negative sense?”
“Absolutely.”
“Okay, four points for me,” Grumpy Jack calculated. “So far so good, Dr. Morrison?”
“Both the hantavirus and influenza A come from the same group of viruses which contain ribonucleic acid, or RNA, as their genetic material. So far they are more similar than different,” Kate summed up. “I take it this means the HV1A virus is also a Class 5, single-stranded, RNA-based virus.”
“Single-stranded, RNA, and negative sense we can confirm. Class 5 at this point is only assumed since we don’t actually know what we’re dealing with,” Nicole replied. “Let’s make it interesting,” she said, with a smile to Grumpy Jack, who scowled across the table. “Do you have eight genes?”
“Go Fish!” Grumpy Jack said haughtily. “I have fourteen. Do you have—”
“Hang on,” Rayna interrupted. “Let’s make sure we’ve got the significance of some of this information first.” Kate thought she recognized a note of doubt, of condescension. Rayna clearly did doubt Kate’s ability to hack the content. “Dr. Morrison, do you need a recap?”
“How many genes does HV1A have?” Kate responded with a question.
“Isolated nine so far.”
Kate trolled through the information in her head, not allowing the questioning look from across the table to intrude on her thoughts. “Tell me why you think the number of genes might be significant,” she finally asked, not caring if she betrayed her ignorance.
“Viruses reproduce rapidly in part because they have so few genes to replicate once they invade the host cells.”
“So the more complex the gene structure, the longer it could take to replicate,” Kate said.
“And the more chances of a virus replication fail, let’s not forget that,” Grumpy Jack said.
“What do you mean?”
“RNA viruses are like kids with ADHD. They often go for speed instead of accuracy. But that means they adapt, mutate, and form new strains.”
Again Kate paused and forced herself to remain micro, making pictures of what she was hearing. “Okay, I get all that. But HV1A isn’t a naturally mutated strand.”
“That’s right, Dr. Morrison,” Dr. Levesque interjected. “But we think that the creator of this virus would have used the RNA polymerase enzyme adaptation to his or her benefit.”
“And don’t forget the reassortment factor,” Nicole cut in.
“You mean when two influenzas infect the same cell,” Kate said.
“Right, the genes can mix and produce new strains. Reassortment.”
“But you don’t think hantavirus and influenza A could have reassorted,” Kate asked.
Nicole shook her head. “I’d give it a ninety-nine percent improbability rate.”
“In the lab, we’ve been able to manually reassort influenzas, but never a virus outside the influenza family.” Grumpy Jack jumped in, sounding irritated, as if the discovery that someone else had done it annoyed him no end. He looked over at his boss. “Whoever it is, we should probably hire them.”
“As soon as they get out of prison for murder,” Kate murmured.
All four pairs of eyes pinned Kate to her seat, and a distinct aura of shock and tension settled on the room. “Sorry,” she said immediately. “I forgot to keep it micro.”
“No, don’t apologize. Sometimes it is good for us to have a reminder of the implications of the viruses we deal with on a daily basis,” Dr. Levesque said, looking pointedly at Grumpy Jack.
“I have a question, and I’m afraid it’s not very micro,” Kate said suddenly, constantly sorting and prioritizing information. “Can you in any way predict the HV1A’s…behaviour, for lack of a better word, based on what you know of the hantavirus and influenza A?”
“Short answer? Yes,” Grumpy Jack said.
“Long answer, no,” Rayna said, giving Grumpy Jack a look that dared him to contradict her. But Jack just smiled and gestured for her to keep talking. “It could take months for us to be able to give an accurate description of the life cycle, from how it binds itself to the surface of a host cell, how it replicates itself, and how those replicated cells are released into the body.”
“Rayna’s right,” Nicole said, almost grudgingly. “There are things we still don’t know about the hantavirus, and that’s been on our radar for over fifty years.”
“Like what?”
“We know it’s zoonotic, that it’s transmitted by infected rodents. Humans breathe in the aerosolized virus as it circulates in the air from infected rodent droppings and saliva. We know it incubates for two to four weeks from point of infection to showing symptoms. We don’t fully understand how it replicates or how it causes the capillaries in the lungs to leak fluid.”
Kate had stopped listening. Now, instead of struggling to make a picture of cellular protease bindings and genetic replication, she suddenly saw a barrage of images. She was not used to thinking on such a small scale. Her macro view of the world was invading the cellular level, and she couldn’t help it.
Dr. Levesque came to her rescue. “Dr. Morrison?”
Kate looked up, the flood of images still hijacking half her brain. “Can I see it?” Kate asked. “The HV1A virus. Can you show it to me and tell me what you see? Either hantavirus, influenza, or new. Is that possible?”
Grumpy Jack leaned forwards in his chair and pushed a few buttons on a tablet in the middle of the table. Window coverings dropped down with quiet mechanical efficiency. At the same time, a screen came down from the corner, and Grumpy Jack tapped on his laptop. After moving around a few files, a subdued, purple-stained microscopic image came up on the screen.
“HV1A-CS. A misnomer, but we’re going with it for now. Once we isolate the hemagglutinin and neuraminidase involved—”
“Perhaps,” Dr. Levesque interrupted, “we can stick to what Dr. Morrison has asked of us.” Her tone held little in the way of humour. “John, if you could isolate the hantavirus components. Nicole, the influenza.”
They did. In detail. Nearly an hour of detail. Finally, though, with Rayna grudgingly adding in the components of the virus they thought were unique to the HV1A-CS strain, Kate began to understand. She began to make the connections between what she was seeing on the slides in front of her, the information given by the epidemiologists around the table, and of course, the pictures already scanned into memory. She still saw the chest x-rays, heard the sound of the rebreather masks, felt the chill of a body during autopsy.
“Let’s take a break,” Dr. Levesque finally cut in. “When we return, perhaps you can share with us the symptomology of your patients.”
As everyone around her stood, Kate pulled out her cell phone, thinking about Andy for the first time in hours. A No Signal message met her when she turned on her phone, and Kate sighed.
“Why don’t you come down for a coffee, and I’ll hook you up with a landline,” Nicole said kindly.
Kate gave her a small smile. “Thanks, that would be great.”
Grumpy Jack—John, Kate reminded herself—accompanied them down in the elevator. The cafeteria was huge and white and thankfully quiet on this Sunday morning. John treated them both, forcing Kate to conclude that maybe he wasn’t so grumpy after all.
Just before Kate bit into her cranberry and oat muffin, she remembered where she was and what the labs housed here: microscopic pathogens, invading organisms, rapid cellular replication. She felt John and Nicole’s eyes on her, and they grinned knowingly.
“Seriously,” John said. “Can you think of a safer place to eat?”
Kate looked at her muffin, then back up at John, smiling guiltily.
“You’re not the first, don’t worry,” Nicole said, taking a huge bite of her bagel and cream cheese. Kate took her cue and popped a bit of muffin into her mouth.
“You eat at work, don’t you?” John asked, stirring a fourth packet of sugar into his coffee.
“Sure, when I get a chance.”
“See, now that’s gross. Do you really go from having your hands all bloody and gory to, I don’t know, eating an apple?”
“Uh-huh,” Kate said, enjoying her muffin now, feeling the heat and kick of the coffee in her body. “Though it’s more likely to be a Pop-Tart than an apple.”
“Aren’t you supposed to be promoting a healthy diet with your patients?” Nicole said dubiously.
Kate threw the last bite of muffin in her mouth. “I’m very comfortable in my hypocrisy.”
Nicole laughed and even John cracked a smile.
Kate wiped crumbs from the muffin off her hands and picked up the large paper cup of coffee, her thoughts wandering back upstairs to the conference room, to the report she was about to give. Questions piled up like a collision in her head.
“So how did you end up here?” John’s voice intruded on Kate’s thoughts.
“Sorry?”
“I’m just curious. How did you go from toaster pastries in the trauma room to sitting in the NML cafeteria discussing potentially the biggest bio-viral threat in Canadian history?”
Kate felt a hook behind her navel, a disorientation so severe that she was suddenly dizzy. She felt filters over her eyes, a sort of slide show of stills, stacked up and blurry. First the dingy green of the trauma room at Van East, the blinding sun through the wall of windows at Hidden Valley General, driving through the Rockies in the Yukon with Andy, Sunday dinner with her mom and Tyler, joking with Craig at the back of a packed meeting room, the mildew-stained walls of the slum house just ten minutes north of where she was sitting right now. How did I end up here?
“Dr. Morrison, are you all right?” Nicole’s voice interrupted her thought spiral.
“Yes.” Kate managed a small smile. “I’m fine. A little jet lag,” she lied easily, her shoulders shifting automatically into a more casual position, her eyes relaxing into a look of fatigue, not stress. Kate ignored the unease that came with the lie, refusing to acknowledge how familiar this was.
“Let’s head back upstairs and I’ll find you a phone.”
A few minutes later, Kate had a small cubicle to herself. She took a long, slow breath before dialing Andy. As the phone rang in her ear, Kate swallowed the last of her unease and double-checked her watch. It was just before seven thirty in the morning in B.C.
“Sergeant Wyles.”
“Hi, it’s me.”
“Kate.”
Kate wasn’t sure how Andy managed to suffuse that much love, relief, and happiness in such a short word. “Hey, where are you?”
“Still at the hotel. I’m just getting ready to meet Ferris at his office. How are things going down there?”
“So far, so good,” Kate told her, feeling her balance beginning to return. “I’ve got some idea what we’re dealing with now, at least as much as the NML has been able to figure out in a short period of time. We’re about to go back and discuss what this means for the patients. There are still so many questions.”
“I know,” Andy said shortly. Kate could hear the tension in her voice. “We’ve got more than a few down here.”
“What’s going on?” Kate asked, feeling very far away.
“Ferris and I are attempting to investigate without raising any alarm even though we don’t have a clue what we’re looking for and all we get is interference from people like Michael Cardiff. It’s like finding a small, dangerous needle in a very expensive haystack.”
Kate knew how much those kinds of restrictions drove Andy crazy.
“What can I do?”
“Do you think your team down there will answer some questions for us? Give us some idea what to look for?”
“I can always ask. You’re going to have to be pretty specific. These are lab people, about as far removed from the field as you can get.”
“Noted,” Andy said briskly. Kate could envision her scrawling in her notepad. “Can you call Ferris’s office in an hour?”
“Sure. I guess I should call Dr. Doyle for the patient updates,” Kate said unenthusiastically.
“Probably. And be nice, she’s getting a lot of pressure from Cardiff and the rest of the hospital board. I think she’s holding up pretty well, considering.”
“Advice from Andy Wyles to be nice, now there’s a change,” Kate teased, feeling only the smallest trace of the unease still in her body. Maybe it really was jet lag and lack of sleep.
“Cute,” Andy said, sounding half amused, half distracted.
“I’ll let you go,” Kate said, taking the cue. “Talk to you in an hour.”
“Sounds good. Kate?”
“Yes?”
“I love you.”
The damp mountain air, Andy’s arms around my waist, the rocking of the porch swing.
“I love you, too.”
When Kate called the hospital, Dr. Doyle was distracted and brusque. Of the six suspected new cases that had come through the ER, three were confirmed to have the virus, no signs of respiratory distress, no red-flagged histories. Eight new suspected cases, results pending. Harris Trenholm was not improving but was insisting his forty-eight hours was almost up, twenty-four hours early. Kate thanked Dr. Doyle, assured her she would deal with Harris when she got back, and even managed to insert a compliment about how she was holding up.
Kate found her way back to the conference room, her red and white visitor’s badge swinging awkwardly around her neck. Everyone was already seated when she entered.
“Dr. Levesque, I was just speaking with Sergeant Wyles, who is heading up the investigation in Hidden Valley, and she has some questions. Would it be possible to have a conference call with her and Constable Ferris in an hour?”
Dr. Levesque looked around the table for confirmation from the others.
“Yes, of course. I only wish we had more information to share.”
“I think at this point they could use whatever we’ve got.”
At Dr. Levesque’s request, Kate handed over the memory key with all the medical information she had from Hidden Valley General and from Dr. Salinger at Public Health. Kate started from the beginning in September with the first case of suspected influenza. She then focused on Roberta Sedlak, her medical history, the autopsy findings. As the chest x-rays came up on the screen, Kate focused on the details and facts, presenting the case in the most relevant medical detail, forcing any thoughts of the potential new cases to the side. Kate tapped the keypad on John’s laptop, and a fresh set of facts, confirmed cases, and autopsy reports raced across the screen in dramatic, macro detail.
The room was quiet as Kate pushed the laptop back towards John, who immediately cycled a few slides back to the graph that had been provided by Public Health on infection rates.
“Newest unofficial information puts those numbers higher. Three confirmed and eight suspected cases,” Kate said. “We should have the serological tests back later today.”
John opened a new document and created his own graph, inputting the newest information.
“What do you need from us, Dr. Morrison?” Dr. Levesque said.
The list was extensive in Kate’s head. A cause, an effective treatment, an antiviral drug. She reined in her thoughts and tried to remain within the realm of possibility.
“Do you see the virus?” Kate finally asked, shifting forwards in her chair. “In the information I just shared with you, do you see the virus? Is it presenting as you would expect? Is it…behaving like you think it would, based on what you know at the cellular level?” Silence again, Kate twisted the ring on her finger, fidgeting with enforced patience. “I know you probably hate these kinds of questions,” Kate said sympathetically. “And I’ll warn you now that Sergeant Wyles is about to ask a lot more of them.”
“Yes and no,” Rayna volunteered. “The majority of the patients exhibit influenza-like symptoms, yet the pathogenesis and resulting pulmonary edema in critical patients is more like hantavirus. But it is also acting like the HV1A-CS virus, of which we know almost nothing. So…no.”
Rayna spoke without taking her eyes off the screen. Kate heard murmured affirmations from around the table. This information didn’t get her any farther ahead, other than to confirm that the small purple-stained slide was exactly what was currently wreaking havoc in Hidden Valley, British Columbia. And for some of the patients, this virus could prove to be fatal. Kate tried not to let her disappointment show. What had she really expected? At least she could see it, at least she was beginning to understand.
“Okay,” Kate said finally, looking up at the group. “I think my next questions are going to be similar to Sergeant Wyles’s. So instead of making you repeat it, maybe we can call her now.”
Kate scrawled the number for the RCMP office in Hidden Valley on a piece of paper and passed it over to Dr. Levesque, who punched the numbers into the tablet on the table.
“Sergeant Wyles? Are we connected?” Dr. Levesque asked, taking her seat again.
“Yes, thanks for your call.”
As Dr. Levesque made the requisite introductions on their end and Andy did the same in Hidden Valley, Kate was acutely aware of time. She had less than eight hours before she had to catch her flight back to B.C., and she was just now beginning to feel the pressure.
“Our main focus right now is to try to discover who is behind this. We’ve spent the last twenty-four hours attempting to uncover any connection to laboratories, virology, immunology, microbiology.” Andy repeated the list in short bursts that maybe only Kate could read as frustration. “Nothing. We expanded the list to be more general: pharmacology, genetics, medicine. Again, nothing of interest.”
Kate heard Ferris jump in. “Hidden Valley has more of your financial and high-tech types, not so much with your academics.”
“Right. So we are looking at two possibilities. One, that the HV1A-CS virus was made in or around Hidden Valley. Two, that the HV1A-CS virus was imported into Hidden Valley.”
“I’d go with the latter,” John jumped in. “Whoever created this virus would need some extensive, sophisticated equipment, not to mention access to the live viruses. My guess? Imported from a university lab.”
“Why do you say university lab?” Andy asked immediately.
“If you’re looking at probability, it’s the most likely source. Other than public or private labs, like the NML or the CDC, hantavirus is researched most often at universities.”
“I’ll need a list,” Andy said. “All the universities in North America who are using the live virus to do research.”
“Names of the heads of research also?” John asked, typing and talking at the same time.
“Can you do that?”
“It’s a shockingly small community,” John said drily.
“Then yes. Next question,” Andy barely paused before moving on. “Assuming the virus was imported into Hidden Valley, what are we looking for?”
Andy’s question was met with silence.
“Think about the kind of containers you would need to transport and store a live virus,” Kate prompted. “The size, shape, materials.”
“We could generate a list, include pictures, if that would help,” Dr. Levesque replied.
“Yes. Next question,” Andy said, moving on.
“Wait,” Kate cut in, thinking about Andy’s request and her own clarification. “High tech and low tech. You need to think about what a lab would use, but also what household items could be used for the same purpose. Think about what you could buy at Walmart that could accomplish the same task.”
Four sets of eyes looked at her with incredulity.
“What?” Kate asked, looking around the room.
“Just the thought of someone transporting the hantavirus in, I don’t know, a four-dollar Styrofoam container from Walmart kind of gives me the willies,” Nicole finally replied.
“Dr. Morrison is right. We can’t make assumptions about who is behind this. So a list, high tech and low tech,” Andy demanded. “Next, any idea how this virus is being spread?”
“That’s our main focus right now, Sergeant Wyles. I’m afraid we have no answer for you,” Dr. Levesque answered, almost apologetically.
“I understand. Given what you know, though,” Andy pushed. “How can we begin to look?”
“Focus on the hantavirus,” Rayna said. “It’s spread by rodents. The virus becomes aerosolized so it can be found in the rodents themselves, but also the dust and dirt in their surroundings. Start there.”
“Samples, then,” Andy said.
“I’m a little confused why you haven’t collected samples already,” Rayna said with evident contempt.
“Two reasons,” Andy said curtly. “Once Dr. Levesque confirmed this was a man-made virus, we weren’t convinced we should be looking at how it spreads naturally. More importantly, it will be difficult to collect samples, particularly on private land, without raising alarm. Once the public finds out we are focusing on rodents, we are one Google search away from mass panic.”
Rayna had the good grace to redden slightly and Kate was surprised when she spoke again. “Aerosolized means not only that it’s in the air but also that it has settled on surfaces. There must be a way to collect samples or swabs that don’t raise suspicions.”
In her head, Kate pictured Andy and Constable Ferris on one of the Ozarc ranches, kicking up dust as they collected samples.
“That’s exactly what we’re hoping to do,” Andy said. “So thank you all for your time.”
“You’ll need protective equipment,” Kate blurted out, interrupting as Andy tried to sign off. “When you collect the samples, you’ll need a way to protect yourselves from the virus.”
“Dr. Morrison is right,” added John, still tapping away at his laptop. “Though biohazard suits would hamper that whole subtlety approach you’re going for, you’ll need level three masks and gloves at the very least.”
“The Public Health Officer is sending someone up in a couple of hours. He’s going to give us a basic safety rundown and a tutorial on collecting samples.”
“If it was me out there, I’d want all the protection I could get,” John said, making a face. “Take whatever advice that guy gives you.”
“Noted,” Andy said. “Thanks again for your time.”
Dr. Levesque disconnected, the slight whine of the speakers disappeared, and Andy’s voice was gone. Kate quashed the unnecessary concern at the thought of Andy and Ferris being exposed to the virus. Still, she ran through the list of Andy’s admitted injuries. Nothing to suggest compromised lungs, nothing that should cause her any alarm. Still…
“Okay, tell me she’s six feet tall with a brush cut.”
“What?” Kate asked, not sure she’d understood what John had just said. Dr. Levesque was back on the phone, not paying attention. Rayna and Nicole, however, were listening in.
“Agent Wyles or whatever. With that voice, I reckon she’s got to be six feet tall with a flat-top. Am I right?”
Kate stared at him. She knew Andy couldn’t care less what John or the entire NML or, hell, even what all of Hidden Valley called her. But Kate took it personally.
“She’s a sergeant,” Kate corrected, her voice hard. “And she’s my girlfriend.”
John’s eyes widened slightly, then his whole face flushed a deep red. He shifted in his seat, his hands fidgeting with his laptop, squaring it to the edges of the table.
“I didn’t mean…” he started to say, but Dr. Levesque interrupted, putting down the phone.
“Dr. Morrison, good news. I’ve got Dr. Peter Hill from the University of Edinburgh on the way down. He’s visiting on a lecture tour and just so happens to have some field experience with hantavirus in South America. He’s agreed to come down and talk with you, though he’s only got an hour.”
Kate pushed aside the awkward exchange with John, her worry about Andy, and her sudden and intense exhaustion. “That’s great, I’ve still got a lot of questions about treatment.” She looked down at her list, crossed off the questions that Andy had covered and basically avoided eye contact as Dr. Levesque broke up the rest of the team.
Dr. Hill turned out to be short, pompous, and not particularly helpful. The last time he’d seen the hantavirus was over twenty years before in New Mexico, and in the first ten minutes of their meeting, he’d managed to repeat three times that the original hantavirus was genetically distinct from the Sin Nombre species Dr. Levesque’s team was researching. Kate asked her treatment questions, focusing on the extent of the pulmonary edema he’d seen in his patients, the efficacy of various treatment options, and his input around how the influenza might affect the hantavirus symptoms.
“Oxygen therapy, Dr. Morrison. I can’t stress that enough. It’s the only thing that worked in the fifty percent of patients who survived,” he kept saying, checking his watch.
When Kate asked about steroids, Dr. Hill just shook his head, saying he didn’t want to speculate on a treatment he’d never seen as they hadn’t had access to that in the field. He did say he would have Dr. Levesque look up the three papers he’d co-authored. Maybe she’d find something of interest in them. Kate, frustrated, managed to thank him for his time as he stood and headed to the door.
“Oxygen therapy, Dr. Morrison!” he called back over his shoulder, as if imparting great wisdom, instead of describing a treatment she had not only tried, but that had already twice proved insufficient.
Kate sighed, rubbed at her eyes, and checked her watch. Just after two in the afternoon, and her flight left at seven-thirty. The disorientation surfaced again, much milder this time, as she remembered where she was. Downtown Winnipeg, a city she avoided thinking about. And she still didn’t know enough. Not nearly enough. She felt like she was returning to Hidden Valley empty-handed. This more than anything caused frustration to burn in her stomach.
The frosted glass door of the conference room opened and John walked in, balancing his open laptop on his forearm. He came right over and plunked himself down next to her.
“I’m sorry for what I said earlier. I’ve got a big mouth, and I’m kind of a jerk, though you probably figured that out already.”
Kate gave him a small smile, but didn’t say anything.
“Anyway, I’m sorry. I didn’t know…” He trailed off.
Kate let him squirm, feeling her own discomfort. What didn’t he know, Kate wondered, that I’m a lesbian? And how am I supposed to respond to that? You and me both?
“Don’t worry about it. Apology accepted,” Kate said, noting his look of relief as she let him off the hook. She wondered if this was what coming out of the closet meant, a repetition of this uncomfortable scene, constantly managing other people’s curiosity and awkwardness, the continuous self-doubt about whether or not she should correct someone’s assumptions about her life. And the layers of shame if she decided to just let it go.
“How’s the list coming along?” she asked John, breaking the silence, wanting very much to move past this on to more relevant topics.
“I want to run this by you, make sure it fits everything Sergeant Wyles was looking for.”
Kate quickly scanned the list of universities and heads of research, not really interested, focusing instead on the pictures and descriptions of containers that could possibly be used to transport and store a live virus. As requested, there were high-tech cylinders and glass vials as well as small foam-packed boxes, dry ice, and small nitrogen tanks.
“How would you do it?” Kate said, looking at the pictures of the containers.
“What do you mean?”
“If you were trying to intentionally spread a virus, how would you do it?”
John thought about this, tapping his fingers on the table in front of him like he was scrolling through his laptop. “Most direct route? Food or water. Most widespread route? Common surfaces or sprinkle it into dust in high-traffic area so it gets kicked up, spread around, and inhaled. That’s why the hantavirus has traditionally been so well spread. No one ever suspects the dust because they can’t see it when they breathe it in.”
“So, you would use different methods of transmission if you were trying to infect one person versus, let’s say, a community.”
“Right.” He suddenly looked uncomfortable. “Not that I’ve thought about it. You did ask.”
Kate had to laugh at him. “Hypothetical, John. It’s all hypothetical.”
John grinned.
The door to the conference room opened suddenly, and Dr. Levesque walked in, her face serious. Rayna shadowed her, coming over to where Kate sat, pulling the keyboard towards her without asking permission.
“We’ve tested the most recent samples sent to us by Dr. Salinger. It looks like the HV1A virus is adapting,” Dr. Levesque said, her tone grave.
“What?” Kate said, not really caring that she sounded utterly unintelligent. But this piece of information threw her, her overfull brain not able to shift that quickly.
“Four of the most recent cases of HV1A are showing a mutation or adaptation of the original virus,” Rayna said, pulling up the purple-stained HV1A slide from earlier and a new one. Kate automatically started categorizing the similarities and differences.
“The protein casing is different,” Kate said suddenly, into the silence.
Rayna confirmed with a sharp nod. “We were just concluding that the virus is most likely spread through contaminated dust particles, like hantavirus and not person to person, like influenza, when Dr. Salinger sent over these images. We haven’t had enough time to really look at it, but the last four patients are apparently exhibiting a mutated form. One that is spread person to person. Nicole is running the test right now, seeing if it reacts to the protease in the throat and lungs, same as influenza A.”
Kate stared at the two nearly identical slides, the phrase person to person looping through her head in a continuous, awful chant. She forced herself to say the next words, to ask the next question, to hear out loud the results.
“So the same effects, the same symptoms, the same risk of acute onset pulmonary edema in compromised patients. Just a faster transmission rate.” She turned away from the slides to look at Rayna. “Is that what you’re telling me?”
Rayna’s face was grim.
“I’m afraid that’s exactly what I’m saying, Dr. Morrison.”