A Conversation With The West Nile Virus

Bailey said, "Word gets around fast. What language was the message in?"

"English, of course. Did you think we lived in Cuba? What's going on with you, anyhow?"

"I'll tell you when you get home," Bailey said. "We've both got a lot of catching up to do."

"The misstatement of the century," Jensen muttered under his breath. But he wasn't entirely unprepared when Bailey said to him, "I wonder if there are any animal groups without collateral cousins or allies."

"Lungfish, maybe," Jenkins said.

"Yes, but how are mosquitoes supposed to infect lungfish?"

"Good question," Jensen said. "Let's take it up tomorrow."

Because it was already after six and Jensen had a date that night.

Read Part Two in the January, 2003 issue of BIGnews.

Read part one at http://web.archive.org/web/20060218202038/http://www.mainchance.org/bignews/read/december2002/sheckley.html

We left our story of the West Nile virus with the threat from Hamster United, the hamster consciousness that had learned of the deal to substitute hamsters for humans as West Nile's new victims.

The hamsters needed to show us at once that their threat was real. Since the hamsters had collateral links with dogs, they appealed to the canine universal consciousness, reminding the dogs that they had been having it easy for too long, living off humans. It was time they did something for the species.

The dog consciousness agreed, and started sending down orders to individual dogs. Seeing eye dogs started running their people into cars and phone poles. Sniffer dogs used by the ATF and police departments, begin to sniff out only thyme. Cuddlesome home pets begin to attack when addressed as "Cuddley-po," or "Dweat Big Dog."

›t took a special agreement by the Universal Congress of Group-Consciousnesses to permit the Hamsters United to install the necessary reactions to produce these effects. It was objected that this would give the dogs intelligence. But this was quickly refuted by a video of Dignity puppies, as they came to be called, chasing their tails in the same silly way puppies always have. This convinced the council that a modicum of intelligence need not be fatal to levity of spirit.

Bailey had a hell of a time convincing his wife of the truth and urgency of all that he was telling her. The only way they could imagine convincing her superiors was by making a training film. They called it "Group Consciousnesses Unleashed! The Next big Threat to Mankind."

It took time and money, but they got it done with assistance from a famous director who liked what he called "weird projects." The Signal Corps gave the film their stamp; of approval, and this, coupled with the increase in dog attacks, convinced the government powers.

The need for action became more apparent when the President was convinced that, unless something was changed soon, they would have to order all household pets destroyed.

An order like that would be unpopular and would lose him the next election. But, as the virulence and frequency of dog-owner attacks increased, it became apparent that to let this go on would also lose him the election.

A search was mounted to find a new host for the West Nile virus and the mosquitoes who carried it. The lungfish, as a possible host, was examined and found wanting: too much trouble to program the lungfish to swim close to the surface, or to equip the virus-carrying mosquitoes to adapt to a life spent at least part of the time under water. The problems of arranging so that the mosquito's proboscis would not become too soggy were difficult, enough.

An attempt was made to get the mosquitoes to infect each other. This proved a failure: there seems to be some kind of difficulty in producing death by auto-intoxication among the unintelligent.

Finally American scientists found a suitable substitute host animal. It was a small, blind mole--the leaf-nosed bat mole-- living in its native Guatemala on corn husks, and bothering no one. It was not even a true mole. It had fewer links with other species than any other creature found. It was even believed that this mole might be Martian in origin, that bits of its DNA traveled from Mars to Earth on meteorites or by some means not yet determined, and that the mole set itself up in blind independence from all the other species of Earth--a creature without an enemy, subsistent only on corn husks which existed in Guatemala in great quantity--a crime of self-sufficient hubris which would be paid for now.

The attack of the viruses was diverted from dogs to leaf nosed bat moles. Teams of scientists, working day and night, found ways to get the moles to reproduce at an unprecedented rate. This broke existing laws against cloning, but they were superceded in the face of the national emergency. Moles were delivered to all parts of the Earth. This was expensive, since several pharmaceutical companies had developed special drugs to enable the moles to live in a variety of climates, from sub-freezing cold to post-boiling hot. The Pharmaceuticals had to be paid their royalties, and mole drugs did not come cheap.

But this turned out to be no solution after all. The universal consciousness of the leaf-nosed bat moles appealed to the Congress of Group-Consciousnesses. The Council, working with what they possessed instead of Intelligence, declared the current state of things intolerable. Unless Earth, in the entity of the United States, immediately ceased and desisted this activity, a universal attack on Humanity by all Consciousnesses would be declared.

Word of this reached the President, causing him to cancel several golf games. Intent on re-election though he was, the possibility of the destruction of mankind worried him. It is reported that he put down his putter and said, "You know, reelection isn't worth it if it's going to cost the lives of everybody on the planet. There is a time when the Higher Morality must prevail."

Millions of high school and college children studied his words in new courses on The Higher Morality. The opposition pointed out that to let mankind perish would be worse than the deeds of all the dictators the President opposed.

"What can we do?" the President asked the Consciousnesses Council.

The Council took a few days to consider the question. Meanwhile, attacks of rabid pugs and frenzied Chihuahuas upon postal workers demanding federal protection went on. The only way to protect the postal workers was to send them out accompanied by at least one guard, armed with an automatic weapon. Given the number of postal workers in the country, this would have been cost-prohibitive. But the President was between a rock and a hard place. Weapons manufacturers tooled up for a big year.

jhe President was in a mood to listen when the Council of Universal Consciousnesses delivered its advice.

They said, "You humans have done a remarkable job with the development of your individual intelligence, and the use of them to improve your individual lots. But an unfortunate bias seems to have accompanied your thinking. That is the notion that the purpose of human life is to enhance said life at the expense of every other form of life. You have taken the position that all creatures large or small are subservient to you, and are there to serve you, to be used, and, if proven unuseful, to be destroyed. This cannot be tolerated any longer. The best we can suggest is that you cease your efforts to destroy the West Nile virus and accept that you must suffer from this disease, and some of you must die, to prevent the worse effects attendant upon destroying or deviating West Nile."

This was of course an unacceptable alternative for mankind, and their self-appointed representative, the president, ,wrestled with it. A decision had to be made soon.

The Congress of Group Consciousnesses now threatened to unleash other doomsday scenarios on the Earth. For a beginning, and to show that they were indeed serious, they declared that all ice cream was henceforth poisonous, and fatal to humans within three days of ingestion. They even put into place a hasty scenario as to how this could happen scientifically--for they knew that unless the scientists were convinced, they would get nowhere. Their autonomous killer spore theory made good sense, its only weakness being the spontaneous generation of the spores for no scientific reason at all. But a rationalization was found as to how this would be possible, and the scientists, showing an unusual degree of good sense, urged the president to close with the offer.