Chapter
3
“Jubilee, you are a bad influence.”
“Coming from you, Doctor, that is a compliment. Don’t tell me you’ve never slipped a patient sweets before.”
“Yes, but I keep it to one a patient. You spoil them. Just because ‘Candy Striper’ is a term for volunteers doesn’t mean you have to go overboard.”
“Well, the kids look so cute when they sniffle. I can’t help myself.”
“At this rate, we’re going to run out of candy.”
“Dr. Tyler, that’s not because I’m handing out too much candy per child.”
“I know. Have we gotten any of the lab results back?”
“They should be done by now. Let me finish my tea and I’ll check.”
“Never mind, Jube. I’ll get it. How’s your throat?”
“Getting sorer. I don’t know what I caught from those kids, but it’s a dilly.”
“You could take an extra hour off and get a nap, you know.”
“No, you’re shorthanded enough as it is. This bug has already laid up half the medical staff, and you’re getting more people checking in. This is a bad one, whatever it is.”
“I hear you. Well, we do what we—”
“Attention. All available staff personnel please report to the operating amphitheater at once.”
“Any ideas, Doctor?”
“Not a one.”
Dr. Ambrose stood in the operating theater, looking up at the half-full gallery. He noted ruefully that the number of people in the room wasn’t going to get any larger—it’s only going to get smaller from here, he thought to himself.
He addressed the room. “Thank you all for coming. Ladies and gentlemen, we have a dire emergency on our hands.”
A picture flashed on the screen. “This was Abraham Auerbach. He came to Sherman’s about two months ago from Earth, according to Customs. He was brought into the hospital three days ago, complaining of severe chest pains, stomach cramping, coughing, and vomiting blood. He’d been suffering from what he thought was a very bad cold for the last three weeks. He died twenty-three hours ago of severe sepsis with multiorgan failure, primarily in the lungs. Our autopsy revealed many of the organs were necrotic.” Dr. Ambrose flicked to images of the organs. A quiet rumble could be heard from the upper decks.
“There is no immediately apparent explanation for this. He had a clean bill of health when he came to the planet. There have been twenty-seven additional cases from all over the world admitted with similar symptoms two days ago. We have had an additional one hundred and fifty-seven cases admitted today. We—” and he started to cough a dry, hacking cough that exhausted him. The audience looked on, ashen-faced. “We have no idea precisely what this is. It doesn’t match anything on file. None of the patients are developing any antibodies.
“Auerbach is currently being designated as the Index Case, our Patient Zero, although that may change as other reports come in. But the real problem is—it’s already spread. The new reported cases aren’t centered geographically around Auerbach. We have no hard data on how it’s spreading nor on its ability to spread—although, to be fair, there’s enough transporter traffic that if it got into a transporter and the biofilters don’t catch it, it could be all over Sherman’s.”
Dr. Tyler called out from the gallery. “There’s another ‘but’ there, John. I can hear it in your voice.”
Ambrose looked up at the gallery. “Yes. Look around you, all of you. How many of your colleagues called in sick today? How many of you know people outside the hospital who are under the weather? How many of you are feeling it, too?”
A murmur went around the gallery.
“Yes. It’s not just here. There’s a twenty percent absenteeism from schools today. I assume there are similar numbers in the workplace. Ladies and gentlemen, it is quite possible that we are all infected. Every last man, woman, and child on the planet.”
Captain’s Log, Stardate 53663.8.
I have invoked a planetary quarantine. No ship—nothing is getting on or off Sherman’s Planet.
The planet’s population has been overcome by a malady that Dr. Lense has taken to calling “Sherman’s Plague.” It is wildly contagious, and right now it appears that at least seventy percent of the planet is showing early symptoms of exposure. Five hundred and thirty-two people have shown advanced signs. We have reason to believe that it’s quite possible that every human on the planet has been infected by it. It’s not impossible that it’s spread to every mammal. We honestly don’t know yet.
What we do know is that things are chaotic on the planet surface. Many essential services were becoming short-staffed due to the illness, and now panic is setting in. Doctors and nurses are leaving hospitals. Local militias have been called up from reserves, a state of martial law has been declared by Planetary Administrator Orosz. All schools and businesses have been closed, transporter usage has been forbidden, people have been told to stay in their homes and rely on replicators. Most of our crew down on the planet has taken over running power stations, communications, computer systems, and security logistics, because so far they haven’t been afflicted with symptoms. They’re rising to the challenge, but I don’t know how long thirty-five people can keep a colony of three and a half million people running.
Particularly hard hit has been the medical infrastructure of the planet. Due to the nature of the disease, the doctors and hospitals were at the front line treating the early cases, and so became very quickly infected themselves. People went to hospitals with the early symptoms, and the disease spread by proximity at an exponential rate. Nobody was expecting this, and according to Dr. Lense the incubation period must have been long enough so that by the time people noticed they were sick, everybody had it. There’s almost nobody on the planet who can do anything. The front line of defense has been knocked out. And in any event, nobody is ever prepared for the entire population getting sick at the same time.
A few people have tried leaving the planet and running for help. Luckily, all of the folks who have tried have been in unarmed ships, and we’ve been able to keep them corralled. It’s kept Wong on his toes, flying after the strays and bringing them home. In some cases Hawkins has had to disable the ships first—with tractor beams mostly. In one case we actually had to open fire.
In a way, I’ve been lucky. Since Dr. Lense is still up here with me, she can still do work on the contagion. She’s been getting as much information sent up to her as possible, and she’s conducting all of the research on the problem via remote telemetry. She’s somewhat limited as to what can be done, but she’s doing the best she can. Her biggest problem is that sooner or later anybody on the planet who’s acting on her behalf will themselves be too ill to help her. I’ve got some of the crew trying to set up EMHs in the hospitals, and Nurse Wetzel and Medtech Copper are helping where they can as well.
Which leads to the personal aspect of the problem: every member of my crew down there is also probably infected—certainly all the humans. They’ve got about a two-week lag behind everybody else on the planet, but they too will succumb to the disease if we can’t find a solution to the problem. Even if they survive, if we can’t find a way to disinfect them, I may be forced to keep them down there for the rest of their lives. Surrounded by corpses. And we have no idea what effect, if any, the disease will have on a Nasat or a Bynar or a Bolian or a Bajoran or on any of the other alien species represented on the da Vinci.
I’m off to sickbay to check in with Dr. Lense. She’s said that she should have some results by now, so that we’ll have some idea what we’re up against here.