Skin : the X-files (10 page)

“Scully, he’s not doing so well. When I brought him in, he was complaining of flulike symptoms. Now the doctors tell me he’s fallen into some sort of coma.” Scully nodded to herself. The symptoms fit with her earlier hypothesis. A viral threat, something that could cause cerebral swelling. The sort of disease that could also cause a psychotic fit and deadly convulsions. “We’re going to have to notify the CDC immediately. They’re going to want to track down anyone who’s had serious contact with the John Doe. And they’ll need to act fast—

obviously, the infected subjects’ conditions deteriorate rapidly.”

Mulder went silent on the other end of the line. Scully wondered if he was still resisting the idea that a microbe was behind the case. Or had the med student’s illness finally convinced him that a disease linked all of the elements of the case together? Then again, she doubted he would give in to reason that easily.

Finally, Mulder’s voice drifted back into Scully’s ear.

“So Josh Kemper’s pretty sick, too?” 91

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Scully took a deep breath. “He’s dead, Mulder. Whatever the John Doe was carrying—it progresses quickly.”

“And you think it’s the same disease that made Stanton kill Teri Nestor?”

“Yes. Like I said before, it’s some sort of microbe that causes a swelling of the brain. And Mulder, whatever Stanton was capable of in that recovery room or out in Brooklyn this morning—I don’t think he’ll be putting up much of a struggle in a few more hours. This is a fast-acting disease.”

Scully heard voices out in the apartment. The paramedics had arrived. “I’m heading back to the hospital with Kemper’s corpse. I’ll find out what this microbe is, Mulder. And after I do—we’re both going to get some sleep.”

For once, there was no argument from the other end of the line.

Less than ten minutes later, the EMS team had secured Josh Kemper’s body in the back of the ambulance. As the double doors clicked shut and the heavy vehicle pulled away from the curb, a solitary figure stepped out from the narrow garbage alley that ran next to the apartment complex. His glossy, sable hair was hidden beneath a baseball cap, and his lithe body swam beneath a long, tan overcoat. His hands were buried in his deep pockets, with just a hint of white latex showing at the wrists.

He watched the ambulance roll quietly down the 92

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deserted street. He could just make out the red-haired FBI agent sitting in the front passenger seat. Her pale cheek was pressed up against the side window, a look of sheer exhaustion in her blue eyes.

The young, caramel-skinned man thought about the discovery Agent Scully was about to make. Certainly, it would chase the fatigue out of her pretty features. The young man smiled, carefully removing his right hand from his pocket. He twirled a tiny plastic object between his gloved fingers. The object was thin and cylindrical, the shape of a miniature ballpoint pen. The young man touched a plastic button on the edge of the object, and there was an almost imperceptible click.

A shiver of excitement ran through the young man’s skin as he carefully examined the three-inch-long needle that had appeared out of one end of the object. The needle was thinner than a single hair, its point significantly smaller than a single human pore. At certain angles it seemed invisible—too small, even, to displace particles of the early-morning air.

So much more subtle than a gun or a razor blade—

and at the same time, so much more effective. The young man closed his eyes, reliving the moment just five hours ago—the tiny flick of his wrist, the unnoticed brush of a stranger in a crowded late-night subway car. Then the second moment ten minutes later, in passing on the stairwell of the Columbia Medical School anatomy lab. A thrill pulsed through his body, and he sighed, wishing he could have watched the results himself.

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But despite his love for his work—he had to adhere to at least a semblance of professionalism. His gloved finger again found the plastic button, and the tiny needle retracted. He carefully slid the pen-shaped object back into his pocket and strolled toward a blue Chevrolet parked a few feet down the curb.

The two FBI agents would be returning to New York Hospital. If he hurried, he could arrive just a few minutes behind Josh Kemper’s ambulance. He had to stay close to the two agents—on the off chance that they were smarter than expected. If they started to get too close again—the young man smiled, fondling the pen-shaped object inside his pocket. Professionalism, he reminded himself. Still, he could feel the warm, almost sexual anticipation rising through his body.

In his heart, he hoped agents Scully and Mulder were absolutely brilliant.

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7

X Four hours later, a triangle of harsh orange light ripped Mulder out of a deep sleep. He sat straight up on the borrowed hospital cot in the cozy third-floor intern room, blinking rapidly. Scully came into focus, her red hair highlighted by the high fluorescent beams from the hospital hallway. She was wearing a white lab coat and gloves, and there was a plastic contact sheet in her right hand. The look on her face was somewhere between disbelief and dismay.

“We’ve found our microbe,” she said, crossing into the room and dropping heavily onto the edge of Mulder’s cot. She tossed the contact sheet onto his lap. “These are shots of the isolated virus taken by an electron microscope. The sample came from cerebrospinal fluid tapped from a postmortem lumbar puncture on Josh Kemper.” Mulder looked at the contact sheet. He could see a 95

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tiny pill-shaped object multiplied a half dozen times in the different-angled shots. It looked so small, so inno-cuous.

“They woke me with the results from the lab twenty minutes ago,” Scully continued. “But I went down there myself to check what they were saying. Because it’s pretty hard to believe.”

“What do you mean? Scully, what am I looking at?” Scully took a deep breath. “Encephalitis lethargica.

We’ve matched it up through the CDC’s computer link.

They’re sending a specialist here this afternoon to confirm the diagnosis. But the EEGs and CT scans coincide. There isn’t any doubt.”

Mulder wasn’t sure if he had heard of the disease before. “So it’s a form of encephalitis? Isn’t that similar to what you predicted—a disease that could cause brain swelling?”

“It is a strain of encephalitis—but Mulder, it’s not at all what I expected.”

Mulder waited for her to continue. She was staring at the contact sheet in his hands as if the pill-shaped virus might crawl right out into the intern room.

“Mulder,” she finally stated, “there hasn’t been an outbreak of encephalitis lethargica since 1922. The virus you’re looking at has rarely been seen outside a laboratory in over seventy-five years.” Mulder raised his eyebrows. No wonder he hadn’t recognized the disease. “How does this virus manifest?

Does it fit the symptoms we’ve seen?” 96

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Scully shrugged. “The disease starts similarly to the more common strains of encephalitis; causing fever, confusion, sometimes paralysis of one side of the body—and in some cases, convulsions, psychosis, coma, and death.

But lethargica also induces incredible fatigue, which is why it’s sometimes called the ‘sleeping sickness’.” Mulder nodded. He remembered Mike Lifton’s droop-ing eyelids and glazed eyes. But Scully still hadn’t told him anything that could explain how Stanton could have reacted with such inhuman strength. And there were still other inconsistencies that were not yet explained.

“Scully, what about the circular rash on both the John Doe and Perry Stanton? Could that have been caused by encephalitis lethargica? And why wasn’t it present on either of the med students?”

“The rash might be unrelated—perhaps a separate infection, one that’s more difficult to catch. Remember, the med students did not have the same level of contact with the John Doe as Perry Stanton. Stanton got a slab of his skin stapled onto an open burn.”

“That still doesn’t explain Stanton’s violent explosion.

Neither of the med students reacted violently—” Scully waved her hand. “Viruses can affect different people differently—and especially a virus like this. Lethargica attacks areas of the brain, as well as the meninges, the brain’s covering. There’s no way to predict how a specific individual might react. During the 1922 outbreak, forty percent of those infected died. This time, we’re looking at a much worse percentage—but at least 97

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the disease has been confined to two people who had close contact with the carrier. That means the virus hasn’t changed its mode of transmission.” Mulder pushed his feet off the side of the cot, stretching his calves. He was becoming more alert by the second.

He hoped Scully was as refreshed as he was—because in his mind, the case was nowhere near over. “You mean it’s blood-borne. Like HIV.”

Scully nodded. “That’s right. It’s transmitted only by blood-to-blood contact. The 1922 version was also sometimes carried by mosquitoes, or biting flies—but that’s extremely rare.”

Mulder reached out and touched one of Scully’s gloved hands. “Scully, both the med students were wearing gloves. How do you explain the blood-to-blood contact? A swarm of mosquitoes in the ER?”

“Latex gloves aren’t a hundred percent protection.

And a skin harvest is a messy procedure.” Mulder still thought it was remarkable that both students had become so sick—so quickly—while the plastic surgery team, which had worked invasively with the harvested skin, had remained healthy. “It doesn’t seem right, Scully. Even if the virus links the med students to the John Doe—we don’t have any proof of a link to Perry Stanton. If Dr. Bernstein was sick, maybe—but he’s not.

The only thing that connects the John Doe to Perry Stanton is the circular red rash.” Scully rose slowly from the cot and took the contact sheet out of Mulder’s hands. “We won’t know for sure 98

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until we’ve got Stanton in custody. I’ve explained the precautions to Barrett—gloves, surgical masks, limited contact—and she assures me they’ll have him within the next hour. By then, the investigator from the CDC will be here to confirm the lethargica, and this tragedy will come to a close.”

Mulder ran his hands through his hair. He didn’t say what he was thinking—that this tragedy was nowhere near the final act. Likewise, he doubted even Barrett would have such an easy time bringing in a man who had shoved an IV rack a few feet into a hospital wall.

Instead, he pressed his fingers against the side of his jaw, testing the stiffness. Then he rose from the cot. “Personally, Scully, I don’t think the CDC is going to make this case any clearer. You can follow the lethargica angle as far as it’s going to go; in the meantime, I’m going to find out more about our John Doe.” Scully raised her eyebrows. “Mulder, we’ve already gone through his chart a half dozen times. The interns didn’t know what was wrong with him—and until we’ve got a body and an autopsy, there isn’t much more we can discover about his death.”

Mulder headed toward the door. “I’m not interested in how he died, Scully. I want to know how he ended up in a medical chart in the first place.” Mulder arrived in the ER just as the trauma team crashed through the double doors. He counted at least six people crowded around the stretcher: the burly chief resident, a 99

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surgical consult in green scrubs, two nurses—and at the tail end of the stretcher, two thickset men in dark blue paramedic uniforms. The smaller of the two was holding a bottle of blood above his shoulder as he raced to keep up with an IV tube attached to the patient’s right thigh.

The larger paramedic had an object delicately braced in both arms; the object was oddly shaped and wrapped in white gauze.

Mulder remained a few feet away as the stretcher passed through the center of the ER, toward the elevators that led up to the surgical ward. He caught a glimpse of the patient between the shoulders of the two nurses: thin, tall, writhing in obvious pain, tubes running out of every inch of bare skin. At first, Mulder couldn’t tell what was wrong—then his gaze moved to the tourniquet wrapped tightly around the man’s left forearm. He watched as the surgical consult took the gauze-covered object out of the paramedic’s arms and lifted a corner of the white cloth.

“It’s in pretty good shape,” he overheard the paramedic say. “Landed under the track, which protected it from the train. Think you can reattach?” The consult nodded, then continued on with the stretcher. The two paramedics stood watching as the rest of the group raced toward the elevator. Mulder shivered, then took his cue and stepped forward.

“Luke Canton?” he asked. He had gotten the name from the ER dispatcher. Canton and his partner had brought the John Doe into the hospital on the night of the 100

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thirteen-car accident. The dispatcher had described him as one of the best in the city.

Canton turned toward Mulder, looking him over. The paramedic was six feet tall, with wide shoulders, and reddish scruff covering most of his square jaw. He yanked off his bloody gloves and tossed them to the floor. “That’s right. This is my partner, Emory Ross.”

“I’m Agent Mulder from the FBI. That was a hell of a scene. Is he going to be all right?” Canton shrugged. His face was grim, but there was something bright, deep in his blue eyes. This was his high—the adrenaline pump of medicine at its most raw.

“Lost a fight with a subway car. But if the surgeon’s any good, he’ll keep his hand.”

Mulder noticed splotches of fresh blood all over Canton’s uniform. “Covered you pretty good. Was it like this with the John Doe you brought in last Friday night?” Canton shook his head. “I figured that’s what this is about. Heard through the grapevine he might have been carrying some sort of virus.”

“It’s a possibility,” Mulder responded. He knew the CDC would probably be rounding up all of the possible risk candidates by midafternoon. He gestured at the blood on Canton’s uniform. “Most likely something blood-borne.”

Canton shrugged. “Well, then we’re in the clear. The John Doe had no external wounds. No blood at all.