Outbreak (9 page)

"I guess so," Tad agreed reluctantly.

It was obvious that he was wavering. The fact that Marissa would only see him if he took her into the lab seemed to force his decision.

He told her that he'd pick her up in half an hour and that she wasn't to breathe a word to anyone else.

Marissa readily agreed.

"I'm not so sure about this," admitted Tad, as he and Marissa drove toward the CDC.

"Relax," said Marissa. "I'm an EIS officer assigned to Special Pathogens for goodness sakes." Purposefully, Marissa pretended to be a little irritated.

"But we could ask for your clearance tomorrow," suggested Tad. Marissa turned toward her friend. "Are you chickening out?" she demanded. It was true that Dubchek was due back from a trip to Washington the next day and that a formal request could be made. But Marissa had her doubts about what his response would be. She felt that Dubchek had been unreasonably cold over the last few weeks, even if her own stupidity had been the cause. Why she hadn't had the nerve to apologize or even say she'd like to see him one evening, she didn't know. But with every day that passed the coolness between them, particularly on his side, increased.

Tad pulled into the parking lot, and they walked in silence to the main entrance. Marissa mused about men's egos and how much trouble they caused.

They signed in under the watchful eyes of the security guard and dutifully displayed their CDC identity cards. Under the heading "Destination," Marissa wrote "office." They waited for the elevator and went up three floors. After walking the length of the main building, they went through an outside door to a wire-enclosed catwalk that connected the main building to the virology labs. All the buildings of the Center were connected on most floors by similar walkways.

"Security is tight for the maximum containment lab," said Tad as he opened the door to the virology building. "We store every pathological virus known to man."

"All of them?" asked Marissa, obviously awed.

"Just about," said Tad like a proud father.

"What about Ebola?" she asked.

"We have Ebola samples from every one of the previous outbreaks. We've got Marburg; smallpox, which otherwise is extinct; polio; yellow fever; dengue; AIDS. You name it; we've got it."

"God!" exclaimed Marissa. "A menagerie of horrors."

"I guess you could say that."

"How are they stored?" she asked.

"Frozen with liquid nitrogen."

"Are they infective?" asked Marissa.

"Just have to thaw them out."

They were walking down an ordinary hall past a myriad of small, dark offices. Marissa had previously been in this portion of the building when she'd come to Dubchek's office.

Tad stopped in front of a walk-in freezer like the kind seen in a butcher shop.

"You might find this interesting," he said, as he pulled open the heavy door. A light was on inside.

Timidly Marissa stepped over the threshold into the cold, moist air. Tad was behind her. She felt a thrill of fear as the door swung shut and latched with a click.

The interior of the freezer was lined with shelves holding tiny vials, hundreds of thousands of them. "What is this?" asked Marissa.

"Frozen sera," said Tad, picking up one of the vials, which had a number and a date written on it. "Samples from patients all over the world with every known viral disease and a lot of unknown ones. They're here for immunological study and obviously are not infective."

Marissa was still glad when they returned to the hallway.

About fifty feet beyond the walk-in freezer the hail turned sharply to the right, and as they rounded the corner, they were confronted by a massive steel door. Just above the doorknob was a grid of push buttons similar to Marissa's alarm system. Below that was a slot like the opening for a credit card at an automatic bank teller. Tad showed Marissa a card that he had around his neck on a leather thong. He inserted it into the slot.

"The computer is recording the entry," he said. Then he tapped out his code number on the push-button plate: 43-23-39. "Good measurements," he quipped.

"Thank you," said Marissa, laughing. Tad joined in. Since the virology building had been deserted, he seemed more relaxed. After a short delay, there was a mechanical click as the bolt released. Tad pulled open the door. Marissa felt as if she had entered another world. Instead of the drab, cluttered hallway in the outer part of the building, she found herself surrounded by a recently constructed complex of color-coded pipes, gauges and other futuristic paraphernalia. The lighting was dim until Tad opened a cabinet door, exposing a row of circuit breakers. He threw them in order. The first turned on the lights in the room in which they were standing. It was almost two stories tall and was filled with all sorts of equipment.  There was a slight odor of phenolic disinfectant, a smell that reminded Marissa of the autopsy room at her medical school.

The next circuit breaker lit up a row of portholelike windows that lined the sides of a ten-foot-high cylinder that protruded into the room. At the end of the cylinder was an oval door like the watertight hatch on a submarine.

The final circuit breaker caused a whirring noise as some kind of large electrical machinery went into gear. "Compressors," said Tad in response to Marissa's questioning look. He didn't elaborate. Instead, with a sweep of his hand he said: "This is the control and staging area for the maximum containment lab. From here we can monitor all the fans and filters. Even the gamma-ray generators. Notice all the green lights. That means that everything is working as it is supposed to be. At least hopefully!"

"What do you mean, 'hopefully'?" asked Marissa, somewhat alarmed. Then she saw Tad's smile and knew he was teasing her. Still, she suddenly wasn't one hundred percent sure she wanted to go through with the visit. It had seemed like such a good idea when she'd been in the safety of her home. Now, surrounded by all this alien equipment and knowing what kinds of viruses were inside, she wasn't so certain. But Tad didn't give her time to change her mind. He opened the airtight door and motioned for Marissa to go inside. Marissa had to duck her head slightly while stepping over the six-inch-high threshold. Tad followed her, then closed and bolted the door. A feeling of claustrophobia almost overwhelmed her, especially when she had to swallow to clear her ears due to the pressure change.

The cylinder was lined with the portholelike windows Marissa had seen from the outer room. Along both sides were benches and upright lockers. At the far end were shelves and another oval airtight door.

"Surprise!" said Tad as he tossed Marissa some cotton suits. "No street clothes allowed."

After a moment's hesitation during which time Marissa vainly glanced around for a modicum of privacy, she began unbuttoning her blouse. As embarrassed as she was to be stripping down to her underwear in front of Tad, he seemed more self-conscious than she. He made a big production of facing away from her while she changed.

They then went through a second door. "Each room that we enter as we go into the lab is more negative in terms of pressure than the last. That ensures that the only movement of air will be into the lab, not out."

The second room was about the size of the first but with no windows. The smell of the phenolic disinfectant was more pronounced. A number of large, blue plastic suits hung on pegs. Tad searched until he found one he thought would fit Marissa. She took it from his outstretched hand. It was like a space suit without a backpack or a heavy bubble helmet. Like a space suit, it covered the entire body, complete with gloves and booties. The part that covered the head was faced with clear plastic. The suit sealed with a zipper that ran from the pubic area to the base of the throat. Issuing from the back, like a long tail, was an air hose.

Tad pointed out green piping that ran along the sides of the room at chest height, saying that the entire lab was laced with such pipes. At frequent intervals were rectangular lime green manifolds with adapters to take the air hoses from the suits. Tad explained that the suits were filled with clean, positive-pressure air so that the air in the lab itself was never breathed. He rehearsed with Marissa the process of attaching and detaching the air hose until he was convinced she felt secure.

"Okay, time to suit up," said Tad, as he showed Marissa how to start working her way into the bulky garment. The process was complicated, particularly getting her head inside the closed hood. As she looked out through the clear plastic face mask, it fogged immediately.

Tad told her to attach her air hose, and instantly Marissa felt the fresh air cool her body and clear the face piece. Tad zipped up the front of her suit and with practiced moves, climbed into his own. He inflated his suit, then detached his air hose, and carrying it in his hand, moved down to the far door. Marissa did the same. She had to waddle to walk.

To the right of the door was a panel. "Interior lights for the lab," explained Tad as he threw the switches. His voice was muffled by the suits; it was difficult for her to understand, especially with the hiss of the incoming air in the background. They went through another airtight door, which Tad closed behind them.

The next room was half again smaller than the first two, with walls and piping all covered with a white chalky substance. The floor was covered with a plastic grate.

They attached their air hoses for a moment. Then they moved through a final door into the lab itself. Marissa followed close behind Tad, moving her air hose and connecting it where he did.

Marissa was confronted by a large rectangular room with a central island of lab benches surmounted by protective exhaust hoods. The

walls were lined with all sorts of equipment-centrifuges, incubators, various microscopes, computer terminals, and a host of things Marissa did not recognize. To the left there was also a bolted insulated door.

Tad took Marissa directly to one of the incubators and opened up the glass doors. The tissue culture tubes were fitted into a slowly revolving tray. Tad lifted out one and handed it to Marissa. "Here's your Ebola," he said.

In addition to the small amount of fluid the tube contained, it was coated (on one side) with a thin film-a layer of living cells infected with the virus. Inside the cells, the virus was forcing its own replication. As innocent as the contents looked, Marissa understood that there was probably enough infectious virus to kill everyone in Atlanta, perhaps the United States. Marissa shuddered, gripping the glass tube more tightly.

Taking the tube, Tad walked over to one of the microscopes. He positioned the airtight specimen, adjusted the focus, then stepped back so Marissa could look.

"See those darkened clumps in the cytoplasm?" he asked.

Marissa nodded. Even through the plastic face mask, it was easy to see the inclusion bodies Tad described, as well as the irregular cell nuclei.

"That's the first sign of infestation," said Tad. "I just planted these cultures. That virus is unbelievably potent."

After Marissa straightened up from the microscope, Tad returned the tube to the incubator. Then he began to explain his complicated research, pointing out some of the sophisticated equipment he was using and detailing his various experiments. Marissa had trouble concentrating. She hadn't come to the lab that night to discuss Tad's work, but she couldn't tell him that.

Finally he led her down a passageway to a maze of animal cages that reached almost to the ceiling. There were monkeys, rabbits, guinea pigs, rats and mice. Marissa could see hundreds of eyes staring at her: some listless, some with fevered hatred. In a far section of the room, Tad pulled out a tray of what he called Swiss ice mice. He was going to show them to Marissa, but he stopped. "My word!" he said. "I just inoculated these guys this afternoon, and most have already died." He looked at Marissa. "Your Ebola is really deadly-as bad as the Zaire '76 strain."

Marissa reluctantly glanced in at the dead mice. "Is there some way to compare the various strains?"

"Absolutely," said Tad, removing the dead mice. They went back

to the main lab where Tad searched for a tray for the tiny corpses. He spoke while he moved, responding to Marissa's question. She found it hard to understand him when he wasn't standing directly in front of her. The plastic suit gave his voice a hollow quality, like Darth Vader's. "Now that I've started to characterize your Ebola," he said, "it will be easy to compare it with the previous strains. In fact I've begun with these mice, but the results will have to wait for a statistical evaluation."

Once he had the mice arranged on a dissecting tray, Tad stopped in front of the bolted insulated door. "I don't think you want to come in here." Without waiting for a response, he opened the door and went inside with the dead mice. A mist drifted out as the door swung back against his air hose.

Marissa eyed the small opening, steeling herself to follow, but before she could act, Tad reappeared, hastily shutting the door behind him. "You know, I'm also planning to compare the structural polypeptides and viral RNA of your virus against the previous Ebola strains," he said.

"That's enough!" laughed Marissa. "You're making me feel dumb. I've got to get back to my virology textbook before making sense of all this. Why don't we call it a night and get that drink you promised me?"

"You're on," said Tad eagerly.

There was one surprise on the way out. When they had returned to the room with chalky walls, they were drenched by a shower of phenolic disinfectant. Looking at Marissa's shocked face, Tad grinned. "Now you know what a toilet bowl feels like."

When they were changing into their street clothes, Marissa asked what was in the room where he'd taken the dead mice.

"Just a large freezer," he said, waving off the question.

Over the next four days, Marissa readjusted to life in Atlanta, enjoying her home and her dog. On the day after her return, she'd tackled all the difficult jobs, like cleaning out the rotten vegetables from the refrigerator and catching up on her overdue bills. At work, she threw herself into the study of viral hemorrhagic fever, Ebola in particular. Making use of the CDC library, she obtained detailed material about the previous outbreaks of Ebola: Zaire '76, Sudan '76, Zaire '77 and Sudan '79. During each outbreak, the virus appeared out of nowhere and then disappeared. A great deal of effort was expended trying to determine what organism served as the reservoir for the virus. Over two hundred separate species of animals and