Christy Esmahan - The Laptev Virus

Molly reached for the mouse. It only took a second for her to see that her kid brother was right. She closed her eyes and shook her head in consternation. She would be in huge trouble if anyone back at the lab found out about the mess-up. They took daily counts of the mice, so at least that number would be fine because although she had taken one mouse into the vivarium, she had brought one mouse back home.

But which mouse had she brought home? And poor Opus, whose life she had preserved, would he now suddenly be in danger? Would she be able to get him back before he became the subject of some hideous experiment? The implications of her mistake pelted down on her as if she had been caught in a hail storm, one sharp whack after another smacking her on her arms and head.

She looked at her watch. Almost eight o’clock. Surely no one would be doing experiments so late at night? But there was no way for her to return to the lab at this hour of the night to make the exchange. Oh, why had she thought it was a good idea to take him back to visit his friends for the day? Why hadn’t she just kept him at home? And how had he gotten mixed in with the others? She had called softly to him and he had come straight back to her. Pet rodents were really good about that. Only it wasn’t him but some weird mirror-twin with the same mark on his right leg. How had she not realized her mistake then and there?

Well, there was nothing for it now. She would be sure to be the first one in room C12 tomorrow morning to rectify the mistake. One night, that’s all. She would make the swap and then bring Opus straight home before her morning class. No one would ever know.

As Sarah plodded along slowly toward the elevator for her urgent meeting with Rhonda Bentley, she had time to ruminate. The truth was that working in the pathology department under the former director of the Center for Disease Control, however glamorous that might sound, had its drawbacks. Maybe it was because she was the first African American woman to have achieved such a high position in that organization. Or maybe she was just a driven Type A personality. Whatever the reason, she thrived on challenges and was perpetually interested in investigating whatever epidemic was making headlines in the world. It didn’t matter that she didn’t actually do the investigating herself but rather foisted the job onto the researchers under her command.

Rhonda had intimated that she wanted to discuss “an exciting new project” for Sarah’s team to study. What would it be now, Sarah wondered. Last year Rhonda had been obsessed with the Ebola outbreak, and before that she had been consumed with avian flu in the Far East. A few years earlier, it had been the typhoid epidemics that had struck the poor island countries after the summer hurricanes.

Rhonda had several high profile investigators on her team, but it seemed to Sarah that Rhonda picked on her more often than on the other investigators. Why didn’t she ask Larry to drop his dengue fever research, or Chuck to cut short his latest projects on protozoan infections? Surely both of those areas were not as important as the research her team was doing on AIDS?

The elevator doors opened and Sarah limped in and pressed the large ‘5’ button. She hated having to take the snail paced elevator up the two flights to her boss’s office, but her bandaged leg gave her no other option. Fortunately she no longer needed the little tricycle contraption on which she had rested her knee for the first few weeks after her surgery. She winced as she remembered the steel post they had inserted into her ankle.

Sarah stepped out on the fifth floor and headed toward Rhonda’s office. As she approached, the office administrator saw her coming and rose to help her.

“Won’t you have a seat, Dr. Spallanzani? I’ll let Dr. Bentley know that you’ve arrived. Would you care for some coffee?”

Sarah thanked her and shrugged off the niceties. She was used to being the fearless leader, not some invalid to be fussed over. Her job was to lead a team of investigators who were researching a way to combat HIV, and they had finally developed a drug which was showing promising signs in its ability to fight AIDS without the slew of nasty side-effects caused by the cocktail of drugs currently being used. Moreover, unlike the other drugs on the market, it stimulated the body to re-grow the immune cells which HIV had devastated. If clinical testing went well, Sarah and her team believed that this drug, which they had derived from aloe plants, could be affordably produced for millions of people.

In another moment Rhonda stepped out of her office and waved Sarah in.

“We’ve got an exciting opportunity,” she said, her eyes shining. “There is a strange outbreak in the Arctic. A new virus has been identified, and I think that your team is in an ideal position for investigating it. What we’re dealing with is the Laptev virus, named for the sea basin in the Arctic where the virus was discovered. Like Ebola in Africa, the Laptev virus is lethal.”

As she listened, Sarah imagined that it must feel like falling in love for Rhonda each time a new project appeared on the horizon. She, however, was not excited about the idea.

“I just feel that abandoning the research that my team has been doing on AIDS just as it was on the cusp of being something really great for humanity, is not something we should do lightly,” said Sarah, hoping to talk some sense into her boss.

“Believe me, I’m fully aware of the advances your team has made,” Rhonda said, smiling. She spoke daggers in the tone of roses.

Sarah opened her mouth to interject, but Rhonda raised her hand, palm outward, to stop her. “I am fully aware,” she repeated, “and what’s more, I promise that as soon as we make some headway on this new deadly megavirus, we will have you back on track with your AIDS research.”

Sarah pursed her lips. She was not mollified but she dared not resist. When Rhonda had first taken over as head of Infectious Disease Investigation (IDI) several years ago, she had quickly dispensed with researchers who did not want to investigate in the areas that she considered most important. It was Rhonda’s prerogative and indeed, her duty, Sarah knew, to be sure that the IDI conformed to the lines of study that would bring in the most prestige and money to the university, so she understood that Rhonda was not merely being tyrannical with her directives. Still, it was painful for Sarah to surrender a line of study that she had invested so much time and effort to develop.

“Now, before you get all defensive on me, let me tell you something else,” said Rhonda in a less strident tone. She was wearing a dark maroon suit with a cream colored blouse. A simple gold chain adorned her once athletic neck. The outfit was very different from the jeans, sneakers and cotton blouses that Sarah wore to work, though her clothes were generally covered by a long, white lab coat. Rhonda leaned back in her chair and tipped her head to the side as she spoke, as if it was a little too heavy from all the CDC experience it contained.

“Riesigoil has promised that they will make this little ‘detour’ worthwhile for us. According to Oscar, the number on the table right now is in the millions of dollars, and given their history with this institution and the urgency of their request, he felt certain we could count on the money.”

Sarah’s eyes widened. Oscar was the president of the UT campus in Houston, and if he was involved, that meant that this assignment was even more important than she had originally thought.

“Oh, wow,” Sarah said, temporarily at a loss for further words. Securing enough money to sustain research labs like hers, paying for supplies and equipment costs, was a perpetual problem at universities. Copious amounts of researchers’ time and energy were used in applying for grants to fund research. For the first time, Sarah found herself warming to the idea.