John Ringo - Under a Graveyard Sky

“So…an attenuated vaccine is damaged bits of a pathogen. Just enough to tell the body ‘hey, you’ve got an infection! And it looks like this!’ without actually infecting you. The…issues are two-fold. More. The first is that if the vaccine isn’t strong enough your body doesn’t get a good enough look at the pathogen and when you do get hit with it you’re not really prepared. And then you die. Or, the vaccine is too strong, has too much of the pathogen left, and you get the disease and you die. Or you’re allergic to the materials in vaccine and you die. Or get really sick. Or there’s a scare story on TV. Or people blame their child’s autism on vaccines. Or…whatever. And in all those cases lawyers get involved and there’s a big lawsuit…”

“Which of those do we have to worry about?” Bateman asked.

“I dunno,” Curry said, shrugging. “Is Dr. Depene getting the vaccine? There’s a guy with so many risk factors, medical and psychological, the answer is all of them.”

“Thanks so much,” Depene said.

“If the recipe is right and I’m making the vaccine… There’s still a small risk that someone may get the disease instead of be protected from it. Half a percent? And to do it I need a radiation generator. That’s the big difference between Pasteur vaccines and modern attenuated. You can be much more precise in your attenuation, not to mention take less time, with irradiation…”

“Well no wonder nobody trusts it!” Depene said. “You’re not going to inject radioactive vaccine in me!”

“As I said,” Dr. Curry said, shaking his head. “Psychological risk factor, which, in and of itself, can cause hypocondriatic reactions. The vaccine isn’t radioactive, you dope. You shoot it with radiation which goes right through. It kills the RNA of the virus. There’s no residual radiation. What I’ll be using, to give you an example, is a dentist’s X-ray machine. Ever had your teeth X-rayed? One of the newer cesium source models is more or less vital. Which you’d better get your hands on fast or they’ll be all snatched up by the time you go shopping.”

“And this will work as a vaccine?” Bateman asked.

“Against the neurological packet,” Curry said, nodding. “It should. The other problem is that it’s going to take nearly two weeks to be close to ‘sure.’ Not ‘this is EPA approved and has been through all testing.’ Sure as in ‘This probably won’t kill you and probably will stop the disease.’ That’s the real problem. To get either one distributed will require all sorts of approvals. And then there’s…other problems. But once it’s through the most basic checks, I’ll start producing. And I’ll be the first one to take it, for what that’s worth to Dr. Depene. Oh, and it’s going to take a primer shot and a booster and you won’t really be covered until you’ve had the booster. And you can’t have the booster until a week after you’ve had the primer . So… We’re fighting the clock, the spread of the disease and the development and production of the vaccine. It’s going to be close. For us. For the world? I don’t give us a shot in hell.”

“Is there anything else critical?” Bateman asked.

“Not that you can’t get on the TV,” Curry said. “But you need to get that X-ray machine. And it will require some installation. Radiation shielding among other things. But that’s details I can go over with Mr. Smith. Until the vaccine is somewhat cleared, we’re in a holding pattern.”

“Very well,” Bateman said, nodding. “Thank you, again, for your assistance in this, Dr. Curry.”

“Just make sure the check clears,” Curry said, chuckling.

“Break this down,” Bateman said.

“The Center for Disease Control and the World Health Organization are assembling an unprecedented group of both professional and amateur synthetic biologists in a desperate search for a cure to the ongoing pandemic…”

“The FBI is searching for a white or Hispanic male in his early twenties believed to have last been seen in the Miami area in regards to the deliberate spread of the Pacific Flu Virus…”

“With the Pacific Flu wide-spread throughout the Pacific Rim, science reporter Timothy Karl has this report on Chinese authorities battle against this deadly disease…”

“Finally some good news as the World Health Organization last night reported a breakthrough in curing the Pacific Flu pandemic…”

“Any idea what he wants?” Bateman asked. All that he knew was that Curry had asked for a meeting. Given that the WHO had announced a “breakthrough” in vaccine yesterday , he’d been expecting the call earlier.

“No, sir,” Tom said. He’d called Curry last night as soon as he got the word. Curry had been tight-lipped and just asked for a meeting the following afternoon.

“Dr. Curry,” Bateman said into the screen. “Still holed up I see.”

“Yes, sir,” Curry said, licking his lips.

“We’re all agog on how you’re going to save us,” Bateman said. “I’d expected the call earlier.”

“Are we secure, Mr. Smith?” Curry said, temporizing.

“We are,” Tom said, curiously. “It’s only the three of us.”

“I’ll have to trust that,” Curry said nervously. “When I covered all the stuff about attenuation in the previous meeting there was a reason: The WHO was kind of ahead of itself on announcing a vaccine.”

“So you can’t make a vaccine?” Bateman said, sitting back, his face hard. “That’s not good news.”

“Just…” Curry said. “Let me get there. There is a vaccine. It’s just a matter of a sort of big logistics issue. The primary vaccine method has been known the whole time. We can do a flu vaccine, given time, in our sleep. But the flu, itself, is besides the point at this point. We need a vaccine for the secondary expressor. We could build a protein sequence mimicking the binding sites for that. They’re working on it. And it will take another two months, minimum. Then there’s certifications.”

“Doctor, we don’t have two months,” Tom said. “I’m not sure we have two weeks at the rate this is spreading.”

“I’m getting there…” Curry said.

“I need an answer , Doctor,” Bateman said.

“You want me to take this slow,” Curry said. “The secondary expressor turns out to be a lot like rabies. It’s definitely based upon it. About thirty percent of the same RNA, similar protein coat… It infects nerve cells. Primarily central nervous system. The spinal cord and brain. That’s…where you find the…face it the zombie virus.”

“Understood,” Bateman said. “And the attenuation vaccine. I think you mentioned lab rats. We got you quite a few. I suppose we can find some of the virus…” he said, looking at Smith.

“I’m sure…” Tom started to say.

“I asked for them assuming that I could work with them,” Curry said, grimacing. “They’re…basically just eating up rat food. Although you should probably get some rabbits or monkeys to use as cover… The thing is… Pasteur and CDC have both confirmed that this pathogen only affects higher order primates. That’s the only source of the virus bodies to attenuate.”

“Oh,” Tom said, leaning back and his face closing down. “Oh…bloody hell.”

“Higher…order…primates…” Bateman said, slowly and carefully. “That includes…?”

“Various…monkeys if you will,” Dr. Curry said, gulping. “Rhesus monkeys would do. Green monkeys possibly. Rhesus definitely. Possibly chimps. Probably chimps… The problem being, the supply of those is already being eaten up by the government for critical personnel. Has been eaten up. Critical personnel and research. There’s just none… None available. That was what I was checking. Thus the logistics problem.”