Randy White - Dead of Night

Laken said, “I know. You’ve told me before. I understand.”

“If we’d been friends, there’d of been no chance.”

“I know that, too.”

“I kinda wish you hadn’t gone to the trouble. Ordering the test, I mean. I don’t see the point.”

The boy turned then, smiling. “It’s not a big deal. I’ll be back in Central America when I find out, so I’ll e-mail you the results, or call. Don’t sweat it, Dad.”

Laken had promised to help paint the bottom of Jeth’s boat, so, after our workout, I left him at the marina and returned to my house alone.

I showered, changed, then sat in the lab making occasional notes on the behavior of the five little bull sharks, while also researching the complex life cycle of guinea worms.

I had more than a personal interest now. It was part of an assignment. If some group of crazies was smuggling parasites and disease vectors into the country, the operation had to be pinpointed, then disrupted. Extreme action was now one of my legal options-if the crazies existed. If I found them.

Biovandalism or -terrorism? One was expensive, the other lethal.

Bioterrorism dates back to the Middle Ages, when attackers used catapults to lob the corpses of black plague victims over castle walls. Disease is an effective weapon. Nature employs it daily. For bad guys, it’s much easier to conceal and transport something like mosquito larva than ground-to-air missiles.

I wanted to learn all I could about their weapons. Understand the weaponry, understand the attackers. Where to find them, how to stop them.

I’d already had a look at a guinea worm through my old Wolfe stereo microscope, comparing it with a photo I found on the Internet. Imagine a one-eyed monster, its head covered with bristles. From that hairy head protruded two oversized scimitar teeth.

No mistaking what it was.

Tomlinson stopped by an hour or so later. He came on foot from the marina, not in his new Avon dinghy. Arrived with his salt-scraggly hair braided into Willie Nelson pigtails,

wearing Birkenstocks, yellow surfer baggies, and a muscle T-shirt that read: A BOTTLE IN FRONT OF ME IS CHEAPER THAN A FRONTAL LOBOTOMY.

I was happier than usual to see him. I’d taken a break from my research, and was reading a distressing article in a scientific journal. The piece presented more proof that our ocean’s shark populations are being exterminated for fins and liver. For commercial fishermen-particularly Japanese fishermen-it’s a quick, space-effective process because the shark’s carcass is then dumped overboard.

According to this study, the population of oceanic whitetip sharks, once among the world’s most common tropical species, had declined by 99 percent since the 1950s. They were now extinct in the Gulf of Mexico.

Ninety-nine percent?

Appalling.

The study blamed overfishing, and called for tougher restrictions. Federal fisheries officials, however, responded publicly, saying that the study was flawed. Further assessment was required.

The data I’d found on guinea worms was as unsettling. I’d printed several articles on Dracunculus medinensis. The sheath of papers lay on the table near my reading chair.

The derivative, Dracula, nailed it. Associated it with a monster who roams around in darkness, living off the blood of others.

Linnaeus, founder of the world system for naming plants and animals, might have found that amusing.

The parasite was also called “the fiery serpent” because of the burning pain victims suffered. To Africa’s Haile Selassie religious devotees, it was the Serpent of Israel. Apparently, any worm that generated spontaneously inside the human body was assigned divine status.

Nope, the parasites weren’t supposed to be found in lakes-or in human corpses-south of Disney World. Not in the Western Hemisphere, either. Except for a few remote villages in the Rajasthan Desert of India, guinea worms were found only in Africa. The most heavily infected regions lay between the Sahara and the equator.

Subtropical and tropical climate, just like Florida.

Nigeria, Guinea, Ghana, Uganda, Ethiopia, Chad, Senegal, and Cameroon all reported thousands of cases a year, mostly in poor rural villages seldom visited by tourists.

I also discovered an article that confirmed that, once infested, there’s no cure. The only treatment is to allow the worms to mature inside the human body, then deal with them as they exit. The parasite could sometimes be extracted within a few days. More often, though, the process took weeks.

During that period, the infected person suffered such agony that it was impossible to participate in normal activities. Pain continued for months. Infected African farmers couldn’t tend their crops, parents couldn’t care for children, victims couldn’t work or attend school, and were often left with permanent crippling.

Infection didn’t produce immunity. People in contaminated areas could be infected again, year after year.

A veterinarian journal suggested that some animals were also vulnerable. Dogs, horses, cows, wolves, leopards, monkeys, baboons-any mammal-could be infested.

I’d been wondering about that. Though it’s not widely known, Florida is among the nation’s leaders in cattle production. Central Florida is also the equestrian epicenter of a multimillion-dollar-a-year horse-breeding industry.

I remembered Harrington telling me that there were other indicators a bioterrorist group was in the States and active. Small-time regional economies were targets.

This wasn’t small-time.

I didn’t know how many thousands of animals were at risk. But I did know that much of the state’s interior is pastureland, open range that’s dotted and linked by ponds, lakes, rivers, and creeks. Natural watering holes for Brahma bulls worth ten thousand dollars a head, or a Thoroughbred stallion worth two million.

Along with a medical nightmare, there was also the potential for economic catastrophe.

As I finished reading, I couldn’t help imagining worldwide headlines: PARASITIC WORMS INFEST DISNEY VISITORS.

How much would that cost the tourist industry? Billions. Add a few more from the state’s agricultural losses.

So when Tomlinson came cruising in humming an old Beach Boys tune that I recognized but couldn’t name, I was more than happy to take a break from the morning’s research.

Tomlinson told me, “Hola, mi compadre, I got a present for you outside. It’s gonna put the zap on that blue-collar, pain-in-the-ass work ethic of yours. So I’m like warning you up front. You’re never gonna be the same again.”

He stood for a moment, peeping over my shoulder at the magazine I was reading; saw printouts stacked on the table. “Hey… a new research project?”

I told him I’d found an exotic parasite near the headwaters of the ’Glades, but I’d give him the details later. I’d dealt with the damn things enough for one morning. I was ready to move on to more pleasant subjects.

He whistled softly as he skimmed one of the articles. “What a buzz-robber this is, man. The worm they’re describing really tickles the ol’ gag reflex. Not that it’s any surprise to yours truly. This is the year for plague and pestilence. Some of the old hippie soothsayers, the LSD prophets, predicted it years ago. The year Mother Earth rallies her forces and fights back against the primates who are killing her. There was an article in Rolling Stone about it awhile back.”

“Rolling Stone?”

“One of the anniversary issues. Had all of the old hippie predications listed. They’ve been making the rounds on the Internet.”

I said, “Uh-huh,” not paying much attention, but then realized he was serious. “Predicted what?”

“It’s like the song ‘Aquarius.’ Remember? Only the prophecy’s a downer, not an upper. The LSD prophets figured it out from the lyrics. When the moon’s in the seventh house-everyone knows how it goes. And Jupiter is aligned with Mars? Well, this is the year. A planetary conjunction on the Winter Solstice, just a week from now. Seven planets in a line. They used star charts to fix the date, and now it’s really happening. Back then, it was a big deal.”