Chapter 21 - Wednesday Afternoon: Special Agent
Summary:
Bogo has come to crash the party, and he's brought along a guest - Interpol Special Agent Daman. Daman's in a bit over his short rabbit ears, so Hugo's got to explain the gory medical details to him, while at the same time defuse an irate water buffalo, and to catch his disbelieving partner up on Bellwether intricate plots!
It's video conference time with four alpha males!
Notes:
This one took me a bit to write, since I was trying to take what was essentially an exposition chapter with four talking heads and make it interesting. This is what I got - let me know what you think!
Wednesday Afternoon at the Tundra Town Central Hospital
"Where is he! Where's Clawhauser!" ZPD Chief Bogo demanded to know as he strode down the hall toward the Tundra Town ICU. A small gold and black rabbit hopped along beside him, trying to keep up with the water buffalo's pace, a feat made difficult by the rabbits tailored tweed three piece suit.
At the end of the hallway, Bogo could see Captain McHorn, the head of ZPD's unified S.W.A.T. command in conference with another rhino in the hospital's security uniform. In the aftermath of the Species Riots disaster three years ago, Chief Bogo and the Police Commissioner had determined that the ZPD's prior adhoc SWAT arrangements needed to streamlined, with a new emphasis on consistent unit training and communication. Too many officers had been injured by the rioters and even friendly fire, and that had left the ZPD dangerously understaffed during the raid on the Prey First headquarters that followed afterwards.
The previous practice of randomly assigning officers to SWAT on a daily basis was replaced with an actual duty assignment at SWAT on a rotating six week basis for all officers. Two weeks were spent in special training, and four weeks spent on alert, after which the officers were returned to their original duty precincts. Instructors were assigned for 4 month training slots, and a senior officer was chosen from their ranks to command the unit for a year. McHorn had held the position for the past year, and was in the running to take the position to take the Chief of ZPD when Bogo retired.
McHorn turned at the sound of his chief approaching. He put his large paws on his tactical belt and sauntered down the hall to meet Bogo. "Hey, Boss." He said by way of greeting, as Bogo slowed to meet him. He jerked his thumb up over his shoulder, back at the ICU doors. "Clawhauser's stuck in there. He's okay I guess, just a bit banged up, but the docs won't let him leave. Apparently the goat he was talking to has some strange disease the medicos have never seen before, and they aren't taking any chances. They've got the entire wing in a level four lock down, and the only mammals they are letting right now are medical staff." He looked down at the rabbit, and then back up at the bull. "I mean, they'll probably let you in if you insist, but you'll have to scrub down and dress in an isolation suit before you can talk to him."
That option did not appeal to Bogo, who found his temper cooling as he watched through the ICU glass doors at the suited medical mammals moving around the halls, the walls of which were sheathed in plastic sheeting.
McHorn continued, "I've been coordinating with Officer Vifaru here, since his director is stuck inside. So far it's just the goat that's infected, but they're not taking any chances. They're prepping the entire wing for more patients. I figured I'd do the same, and I've got my teams setting up a command center in the parking garage, as well as deploying units around the hospital." He gestured down the hall,
"Even if this all turns out to be a false alarm, I thought it would be a good training exercise for my troops."
The rabbit in a suit spoke up, "Why are you setting up a command center in the parking lot? Isn't it cold out there? Why not use one of the conference rooms in here?"
McHorn looked over at Bogo, who just rolled his eyes. McHorn blinked at that display, but turned to answer the smaller rabbit anyway, "The cold air acts as barrier to most infectious agents, like bacteria or viruses; it tends kill them pretty quickly. Plus that keeps my officers out of the hospital's staff's way, but close by the hospital entrances if they are needed in a hurry." McHorn didn't know who the suit was, probably a governmental bureaucrat, but he wasn't going to take a chance by being rude to him, even if Bogo was clearly irritated by the small mammal. The Species Riots had at least taught him that much; never judge a mammal's capacity for petty and vindictive behavior based solely on their size.
He turned and pointed at a room of to the side, "Anyway, the docs' had us set up a video conference room for face-to-face communication with them. It should be up and running right now." He walked over and opened the door for the mismatched pair, and stood to the side, gesturing them to enter.
Hugo looked up at his screen at the sound of the door opening in the other conference room, having been warned by the shouting that Bogo was coming. He watched as the bull strode in to the room, and as the chief started to speak, Hugo just held up his paw. On the screen, Bogo closed his mouth as he frowned at the image of the smaller cat. Hugo just smiled, as he had learned that most of the dominance bluster that Bogo projected was pure bluff. The water buffalo actually cared deeply for his officers, even if he would never verbalize it in that manner.
He hastened to assure the bull anyway as he spoke into the microphone, "Hello, Chief Bogo. Sergent Clawhauser is fine, insofar as any cheetah can be for taking an enraged goat to the chest. His vest and trauma plate took most of the damage from the impact, but he still has some cracked ribs and a bruised sternum. Breathing will not be fun for a while. He also has a mild concussion from where he impacted the floor after being knocked down. He will recover, but I suspect that he'll be out for at least six to eight weeks to heal. Cracked ribs take a while. He's currently isolated for other reasons that have to do with the goat's current infection, which is why we called the alert. I'm going to wait on that portion of the briefing until Emmanuel is done with his blood draw, and then we can bring you up to speed on what we discovered." The trick to controlling an conversation with Bogo was to answer his questions before he asked them. That kept the glowering and sarcasm to a minimum.
Hugo pointed on his screen to the suited rabbit, "Is this one of your plain clothes officers?" Hugo hadn't known that they were accepting smaller herbivores into the ZPD now. He also wondered where Wilde was, as he had expected the hard nosed fox to tag along. But if he wasn't here, Hugo wasn't going to inquire as to where he was.
Bogo looked over at the smaller rabbit, "No, this isn't one of my officers. Doctor Wiedii, may I present Agent Daman? He's come on board to help us with our Night Howler investigation." Bogo waved a hoof in the rabbit's general direction.
The agent arched an eyebrow as he looked at Bogo, who didn't meet his gaze. The rabbit just twitched an ear as he got up into his chair. Hugo realized they were playing a dominance game with each other. How very interesting, he thought.
The gold and black rabbit pulled his black coat down, and addressed the screen, "Commonwealth Interpol Special Agent Justin Daman, Organized Crime division. I've been assigned to head up the Zootopia Night Howler Task Force, Doctor Wiedii." He explained to Hugo. Bogo coughed into his paw. Agent Daman turned and glowered at the bull. Oh, this is most definitely a dominance game. Bogo hates it when any outside mammal butts into what he considers internal police matters! Hugo knew.
"Organized Crime? What does that have to do with Night Howlers?" Emmanuel asked as he came up to sit beside Hugo, taking a swig of his water bottle as he did so.
"I'm a forensic accountant, Doctor...?" The agent replied, unsure who this new mammal on the screen was.
Hugo handled that response, "Agent Daman, may I present my medical partner, Doctor Emmanuel Muskat, neurosurgeon." He pointed to Emmanuel, and continued for the muskrat, "Forensic accountants follow the money, Emmanuel."
"Doctor Muskat," the golden rabbit responded formerly.
He just waved a paw at the rabbit, "Emmi, please. Only my patients call me Doctor Muskat." The rabbit looked like he would rather gargle sand than be that informal with a neurosurgeon.
Bogo impatiently tapped his paw on the conference table in front of their screen as he sat down as well, "Can we move on, please? Why did you two declare an alert?" He asked the two doctors.
Hugo turned to Emmi, "Emmanuel can brief you on the first part, and then I can address the actual alert?"
Emmi took a deep breath before he explained what happened to the two law enforcement officers, "At approximately 8 am today, an attendant in a Tundra Town parking garage investigated banging noises coming from the parked cars. She found a Hircus goat lying nude and unconscious at the base of a support column. Fire rescue was called in, and they transported him to the ER here. While cleaning up his hear to ascertain the extent of the injuries, the resident noted additional clear fluid leaking from the skull along with the blood." He pause, and expanded for the confused looking agent, "Clear cranial fluid is usually an indication of a rupture in the sac that contains the brain, Agent Daman." He continued, "The ER resident immediately alerted me, and I hurried over from my office. I examined the patient, and based on the leakage and scalp trauma, I immediately had him transferred to surgery." Hugo took a moment to split the conference screen, and pull up a picture of the goat in the ER.
Emmi continued, "While I was in transit, the Radiology department had managed to get several shots of the patient's cranium, which cleared showed some fractures in the skull and what looked swelling in the brain. After reviewing those x-rays, I decided to go ahead and install a drainage shunt to help bring down the swelling. I was is the process of pulling the scalp back to install the shunt when we discovered evidence of multiple past fractures. Hugo, could you pull that up, please?" He asked his partner.
Hugo did so. Bogo was unmoved by the picture, but Agent Daman put his paw over his mouth and swallowed. Hugo continued, "I apologize for the gruesome nature of the photo. It's necessary to peel back the scalp in cases like this so that we can visually identify any breaches in the skull, or missing shards of bone. It was after Emmanuel had found this damage that he contacted me and asked me to come in and consult on this."
Bogo scowled as he spoke up, "That is a lot of fractures, but I have to ask what this here has to do with your bio-hazard alert."
Hugo assured him as he cleared the screen, "Actually, quite a lot. Please bear with us as we walk you through it. I hadn't seen the video footage when I had arrived, so I had examined the patient after Emmanuel had finished with his surgery. My initial thoughts were schizophrenia and the patient was self harming to quiet the voices, except that I noted his lymph nodes were swollen."
The rabbit finally perked up, "He has a compromised immune system?"
"Maybe so, sir." Hugo had hope for the agent after all, "At that point Emmanuel and I exited the patients room, and reviewed the security footage. I assume that you have seen it, Chief?" He asked the bull who just nodded, "The goat could be seen creeping around the cars and trucks as if he was searching for something. In the process of that doing that, he rammed two trucks and finally a concrete post, knocking himself unconscious. It was the final ramming that created his most recent fractures." Hugo played a quick loop of the goat ramming the post for the rabbit's benefit.
"What would cause this behavior?" Agent Daman asked. Bogo looked bored by the presentation, since he had seen countless mammals hurting themselves in a myriad of imaginative ways during his career, but for the accountant this was plainly something new.
Hugo shrugged, "Any number of factors, including schizophrenia, drugs, alcohol, or neural infections. In this particular case, Night-howler intoxication." His face was grim.
That got Bogo's attention. He quickly leaned forward and demanded, "Are you sure about that? This is a Savage event?"
Emmi just nodded, "Hematology confirmed that he has Night-howler bio-reaction markers in his blood. In both today's sample and yesterday's sample as well."
That confused Bogo, "Yesterday?"
Hugo nodded, "As chance would have it, I had examined him separately at the Tundra Town Free Clinic yesterday morning. He wasn't showing signs of savage behavior at the time; in fact he was sleeping when I saw him. The doctor who asked me to look at him was concerned about his uncontrolled giggling when she had seen him. She initially thought he was high, but she want to know if brain trauma could cause that. I wasn't able to give her a diagnosis at the time, but it was possible. Last I knew, she was waiting for the blood work to come back from here. He must have left of his own volition." He shrugged, "The clinic didn't report anything to me about him leaving, so I have to assume he wasn't savage at the time when he left."
Hugo continued, "It was based on that initial examination as well as the events in the video that I saw that greatly concerned me, and I ordered the Hematology lab to test both samples immediately for several possibly relevant diseases as well as night-howler. The results that came back from the testing showed levels consistent with a full blown night-howler savage event for today, but that his levels from yesterday were maybe ten percent of the current level. Those lower levels may account for his giggling."
Bogo spoke up again, "Giggling? I thought that when you were exposed to night-howler, the effect was almost instantaneous. You don't have time for laughter."
Hugo nodded, "When you are exposed to the concentrated toxin, like the one Bellwether prepared, certainly. Time from initial exposure to full savage could occur in a matter of seconds, especially if the marks-mammal who delivered it managed to get it on or near the carotid artery. The toxin is readily absorbed by the skin, and transferred to the blood stream, and from there directly into the brain."
Hugo brought up a picture of the actual plant, "But if someone ate the base plant, it can take a while to fully affect them. For instance, if the patient had raided a local vegetable garden that had night-howler growing around it, he could have mistakenly eaten it while eating other plants. It can take about fifteen hours for food to be digested by a mature goat, so he could have ingested the Night-howler just prior to his visit to the TTFC, and then gone fully savage last night. After that, it should be one to two days for the savage effects to naturally wear off."
The rabbit raised his arm and waved it to get Hugo's attention. "I'm sorry, Agent Daman, you have a question?" Hugo paused.
"A couple actually, if I may. You keep referring to markers and levels. Are you talking about night-howler antibodies? And what do you mean that the effects wear off naturally? I was under the impression from the reports that the victims of Bellwether's attacks were rendered permanently savage until treated with the antidote."
"The night howler toxin is actually too small to see with optical microscopes. We can barely detect it even if we use an electron scanning microscope. So normally we detect the presence of night-howler by measuring the response of the body's cells to the toxin; the toxin is a broad spectrum irritant, so many of the cells that encounter the toxin will release different chemical compounds in proportion to their level of irritation. We measure those different levels, analyze them, and then from there we can establish how much toxin is in a patient's system. And depending on the establish levels from the testing versus the mammal's actual body mass, we can predict how strong the savage response will be. The effects can range from anything from mild intoxication, like uncontrollable giggling, all the way up to full blown savage episodes."
"Now, if the patient actually just ingested the plant as opposed to being shot with Bellwether's variant, the length of intoxication time will differ because the toxin there is subtly different. In the natural plant, the toxin is bound to an alkaloid base, and it's this alkaloid that the immune system responds to. So after a period of intoxication, usually a few days, the body is able to flush the toxin and it's attached alkaloid out via the kidneys."
"But in the case of Bellwether's toxin, they had purified the toxin by distilling it from the plant matter, and in doing so they separated the toxin from the alkaloid. Without the alkaloid, the immune system doesn't recognize the toxin, and doesn't remove it from the body. In fact, most of the immune cells are equally irritated by the toxin, including the t-cells, b-cells, macrophages, and microglia in the brain itself. They just ignore the toxin as a result, and so it just remains in the body, much like heavy metal poisoning does."
"The anti-toxin that we developed for Bellwether's variant isn't an antibody in the traditional sense, in that it doesn't attaches to the toxin to identify it for the immune system to remove. It's actually an enzyme that breaks up the toxin at it's sulfur-sulfur bonds, rendering the pieces inert, allowing the kidneys to finally filter it out of the bloodstream."
Emmi rolled his eyes after Hugo finished his explanation. The agent's own eyes had glazed over half way through Hugo's lecture, so Emmi gently asked him, "Did that make sense to you?"
"Sort of? Actually, not really." He shook his head. "It's all very confusing."
"Good God, Mammal!" Bogo thundered, "Haven't you read any of the briefing documentation?"
The indignant agent shot back, "I tried! Your officer Wilde gave me years and years worth of it to read, and a lot of it is filled with medical gobbledygook that I don't understand." the agent complained. He was rapidly feeling out of his element. He had never had to deal with bio-weapons in organized crime before. Recreation drugs certainly, but not bio weapons. This was much more of Anti-Terrorism's bailiwick. He was starting to wonder if his superiors had assigned him to this task force as a means of setting him up to fail? If so, who did he piss off in the chain of command this time, and who's ass did he need to kiss to get out before he was ground into rabbit paste by this irate water buffalo and his conniving deputy of a fox?
"That's quiet alright, Agent Daman. I'm sure that Doctor Wiedii would be happy to explain it all to you again, after we're done here. Won't you, Hugo?" Emmi smiled at the cat.
"Oh, certainly!" Hugo nodded. He loved educating the ignorant. The rabbit looked less certain of this.
While it was fun to watch the rabbit squirm in ignorance, this was all taking to long, in Bogo's opinion. "Why do you even need to wait for the goat to finish digesting his poisoned meal? Why don't you just use the anti-toxin? We need that goat conscious so we can question him!" Bogo roared on.
"Question him?" Emmi burst in, "Of all the stupid ideas! You can't use the anti-toxin on him; he's got advanced swelling on the brain! Which he wouldn't have had if your shumck of an officer hadn't set him off!" Emmi yelled across the video conference link.
Hugo reacted quickly, holding up his paw to forestall a counter explosion from Bogo, and placed his other paw on Emmi's arm to calm him down. Bogo looked livid at the insult, but underneath it all Hugo could recognize a current of shame. Suddenly he understood, Bogo had sent Clawhauser! And now he feels guilty that the cheetah was injured, especially since he hadn't known about the night-howler!
"Chief Bogo, the anti-toxin is toxic in it's own right. It requires the ingestion a liter of water for every 30 kilos of mammal body mass to avoid damaging the kidneys when they filter it and the broken down night-howler from the blood stream. The patient already has swelling on his brain, and can not have even more fluid introduced into his body until that swelling subsides. He's currently in surgery as we speak, having portions of his skull removed by a cranial reconstruction surgeon to allow room for that excess swelling. He will be in no condition to answer any question anytime soon, if ever." Hugo took a breath, and took his paw off of Emmi before continuing, "Beside which, if the patient has been in night-howler induced fugue state since last night, he won't remember why he was in the garage, much less his assault on Clawhauser. Even if he could talk to you now, he won't be able to tell you why." Bogo slowly sat back down as he chewed on that.
Agent Daman spoke up, "Why won't he remember?"
Hugo turned to him, "Night-howler bio-toxin interferes with a great many different conscious brain functions, including the transfer of short-term memories to long-term memory. If a mammal is exposed to the toxin, and then immediately cured, they will remember the experience. But if they sleep or are rendered unconscious, they will loose those short term memories. It is part of the whole savage effect; what the victims described as 'being trapped in the now' of savage thoughts, unable to break free, or remember distinctly what they did during the savage period. Past events will be very fuzzy and indistinct."
Bogo leaned forward and asked with concern in his voice, "A liter of water per 30 kilos of mammal mass?"
Hugo nodded, "Yes." Understanding dawned in Hugo's mind, "You have been making sure that your officers have plenty to drink when you do your night-howler training with them?" Probably not.
Bogo scratched his head, "Well, we haven't been restricting them from drinking..." he petered off.
Hugo sighed, "Chief, I'll come by later this week to review your policies and procedures on the anti-toxin application with your officers, alright?"
Bogo nodded his head, "Yes, please." He furrowed his brow, and then pointed at Hugo again, "Wait a minute. If Clawhauser just has cracked ribs, and you know the goat had night howler in his blood, why don't you just give my officer the anti-toxin, with the right amount of water certainly, and be done with it? Why are you still holding him in isolation?" Bogo was looking thoroughly confused.
Hugo traded a look with Emmi and then leaned forward, "Because of this." He hit a button on his keyboard, and a picture of the goat's blood came up on the split screen, the little blue starfish featured predominately in the middle of all the red blood cells.
Both Bogo and Daman stood up to get a closer look at it. "What is it?" Bogo asked.
Emmi answer, "We don't know. We've never seen anything like it, and neither have the pathologists at Hematology or Immunology. Nobody knows what it is."
Hugo pointed to the picture, "That's why we called the alert. The patient's blood is filled with them, and we don't know what they are. We do know that Clawhauser was potentially exposed to what ever they are, both from the time he spend in the patient's room talking at him, and when he was assaulted. Emmanuel and I were potentially exposed because we treated him, both initially and after he rammed Clawhauser. We are getting our blood tested now to see if these cells are in our systems as well."
Emmi added, "What's worse, Chief Bogo, is that Hematology can't find these 'Starfish', as they are calling them, in the patient's blood sample from yesterday."
Bogo sat back down heavily, as he finally understood the reason for the alert, "They appeared in the past 24 hours?" Both doctors nodded.
Agent Daman asked, "Is that bad?" Bogo just nodded, too shocked to try to irritate the rabbit.
Hugo responded, "Yes, if this is a pathogen, and it appeared that quickly, then it is potentially either very contagious or very rapid in it's onset."
Bogo set his elbow on the table in front of him and pointed at Hugo, "Alright, Doctors. What's it's connection to night howler? What aren't you telling us?"
Hugo took a deep breath, "After I saw this picture, I had leapt to a certain conclusion. Emmanuel had chastised me after I voiced that conclusion to for confusing correlation with causation, and I had to allow that this 'Starfish' may indeed simply be a reaction by the patient's goat immune system to the presence of night-howler, but that thought was banished by the picture from the scanning electron microscope that we saw next." He brought up the micro-graph of the Starfish for them to see.
"Is that a night howler flower?" The agent asked.
Bogo's jaw dropped open, and he looked at Hugo again. "Yes, it's real, Chief Bogo, that's the 'Starfish'." Hugo nodded to Bogo. "But before I can continue with this discussion, I need your authorization to discuss the Bellwether case information freely with Emmanuel." Bogo just raised an eyebrow. "I believe that it is entirely relevant to the events at hand, and you can't really argue that Doctor Muskat isn't involved with the night-howler case now."
Bogo spoke, "No, you can't." He looked over at the rabbit.
Agent Daman looked back at him, until he understood what Bogo was waiting for. Passing the buck, Bogo? Agent Daman just shrugged, and gestured back at Emmi with his paw.
Bogo turned back to the screen, "Welcome to Zootopia's Night-howler Task Force, Doctor Muskat."
Emmi dryly responded, "Thanks." He hadn't missed that subtle interchange between the two law enforcement officers. This was going to be a joy!
Hugo turned to Emmi, "When I was brought on to the Task Force three years ago, to help in the development of a cure for the savage mammals, I was shown a scrubbed version of the data that the ZPD's Confidential Informant was able to get out of Bellwether's operation. I don't know the identity of the CI, so I can't evaluate their connection to the data..."
"Nor will you," Bogo interrupted him. Hugo just nodded.
"Why not?" asked Emmi, "I would think you would want to pin a medal on that mammal!"
"Perhaps." admitted Bogo, "But since my officers believe that the CI died in the process of getting that data out, there isn't a compelling reason to release that information." He scowled before continuing, "They were also concerned that the CI's family would be at risk to retaliation by any of the members of the Bellwether's gang that we were unable to find, convict, and incarcerate. As a result, we are keeping that information confidential on a need to know basis for the time being."
Hugo just gestured his acquiescence to this requirement with a shrug.
Agent Daman was another matter, "Really? And am I on that need to know list, Chief Bogo?" he asked in a low and dangerous voice, "because I don't know the CI's identity either. And I will need to know that so that I can accurately evaluate my information." He focused his attention squarely on the water buffalo.
Bogo realized that he had just trapped himself. Three years ago he had agreed with Sargent Wilde's reasoning on the subject, feeling that discretion was the better part of valor, as it pertained to disclosing the extent that Judy Hopps had been involved in Bellwether's operation. He had felt that the rabbit had earned their respect with her actions on behalf of the city and as such he didn't see a need to draw her name into the public portion of the investigation, particularly since she was most likely dead. She had suffered enough in her short life. But now he was starting to question the eventual wisdom of that course of action. Sargent Wilde had argued that it would have hurt her family, and Doctor Wiedii as well, to know the full extent of her involvement, and that they might have sought further answers that would just have led them to harm. But some secrets can't stay secret forever, certainly not with this Interpol rabbit now in his lap.
The outgoing Zootopia police commissioner had made it clear to Bogo that if the Chief was going to step into his shoes, the bull was going to have to let go of some of his personal control of the ZPD's day-to-day operations so that he could focus on the big picture. And the commissioner had also expressed his concern that the Night-howler investigation had stalled without measurable results after three years, and that they still had unanswered questions about Bellwether and the extent of her organization. It was the commissioner that had asked for the Interpol agent be assigned to the Task Force, just so that Bogo could let it go. And since Sargent Wilde was still too junior an officer to handle the national and political baggage that came with the subject, they needed someone from the outside who could handle the shit-storm if it all blew up in their collective faces.
The problem was that Bogo didn't believe that the ignorant rabbit could handle the job, and he was going to fuck it all up before he was done. But the bull could only stall the hand-over so long before forcing the commissioner to step in, and if that happened he could kiss his next posting goodbye. The commissioner's faith in him would evaporate, and the post could end up going to somebody more politically astute, like Captain Snarlov. Bogo couldn't stand the thought of being passed over in favor of that mob-connected polar bear.
Damn it! He raged internally, as he was forced to make this decision. Well, Sargent Wilde, you convinced me to keep quiet, so let's see if you can convince the rabbit as well! And with that decision, he threw one of his best officers under Agent Daman's bus.
"Ask Sargent Wilde when he gets back, since he was the CI's point of contact with the ZPD. He'll be able to walk you through their qualifications better than I can." Bogo assured the rabbit. And if the fox couldn't, well then he had better learn how to blow smoke up the rabbit's ass and fast!
Hugo watched the interchange between the two of them. It was plain to him that Bogo resented the rabbit's presence, but that he couldn't do anything about. And while the rabbit was completely in the dark about the larger medical issues at play, he was in his element ordering larger and more dangerous mammals around. Hugo was glad he wasn't actually in the room with the two of them.
"Anyway," he continued with his explanation to Emmi, "While I can't verify the extent of the CI's involvement in the actual Night-howler developments, the science portion of the data was relatively straight forward and well documented. Bellwether and her gang had worked through several iterations of the toxin as they developed a working model for their terror weapon."
"What she referred to as Mark Zero was just the base plant. Not very useful as a weapon. Mark One was the distilled toxin extracted from the base plant, and enclosed in a paint ball capsule. This was the main variant that she used for most of the predator victims. But toward the end of her first year in office there was an incident at a Meadowlands pub, where by eight local predators all went savage simultaneously."
Hugo pulled up a picture of the Meadownlands pub with police tape covering the door, "Five of the predators escaped the premises, after killing three of the smaller predators that had also gone savage, and those five then went on to kill several more mammals outside. That incident was what was considered the spark that ignited the species riots." He pulled up footage of the destructive riots, with vehicles burning and shops being smashed.
"What the ZPD investigating team quickly realized from the bar incident was that there was no way that Bellwether's main shooter, Doug Ramsey, could have entered the bar undetected, nor were there any open widows though which he could shoot. And if he had been inside, there was no way he could have been able to shoot all 8 of the varied predators there sequentially without the others noticing and taking defensive actions. The bar's security footage confirmed that." He pulled up photos from the crime scene unit trying to calculate shooting angles.
"From the Night-howler documents that were recovered from the CI, we learned that Bellwether had engineered the whole thing, including ordering the ZPD to cover up that attack in the name of public safety, while at the same time arranging to leak the bar security footage as well as releasing traffic cam footage of the more gruesome prey deaths. The incident, and the species riots that followed it, had been engineered by her so that she could move forward with an aggressive program of predator suppression, utilizing electric shock collars that all predators would be forced to wear." He pulled up photos of the shock collars taken from a PF warehouse after a ZPD raid.
"Bellwether had set up the entire bar incident as a bio-weapon field test of what she called Night Howler Mark Two, an aerosolized variant of Night-howler whereby doses of the bio-toxin were encapsulated in microscopic 'cages' that dissolved as soon as they encounter a mammal's mucus membranes. Those eight victims were intoxicated simultaneously by this means, piped into the ventilation system via a tank with a time delayed release system." Hugo pulled up a diagram of the bio-toxin cage for Emmi from his secured files.
"But before she could get the shock collar program rammed through the city council, she fell to her death from her hotel balcony after a night of drunken celebration. And after her death and the destruction of her Prey First movement, the city held it's breath, but there were no more cases of random predators mysteriously going savage. It was done." Hugo turned off the images, and switched back to the conference. He leaned back.
"Or so I had believed, right up until I saw what happened today with that goat, and with what was going on in his bloodstream." Hugo took a deep breath, "There was at least one more variant that she had been discussing, but we believed that it was never developed, and that variant was what she referred to as Night Howler Mark Three. There were only a few documents available on it, but from what we could gather, Bellwether was proposing to develop a microbe based variant of night-howler. The host would be infected, either by injection or aerosol, the microbe would then replicate in their body, and after a certain threshold was reached, the microbe would dump it's payload and the victim would go savage as result. It was an untraceable method, and would have been perfect as a terror weapon, except that she died before it was even developed."
"And now, it seems to me, that some mammal has succeeded in doing exactly that."
"I still think you are leaping to conclusions, Doctor." Emmi gently pointed out. Hugo just nodded.
"Why do you think that? Doctor Wiedii just outlined a series of technical advances that Bellwether managed to make in the pursuit the perfect delivery system." Agent Daman gestured across the table at Emmi, "You don't think some mammal could have done it?"
"Not in the past three years, I don't. This sort of thing isn't the work of a lone nutcase working out of his mother's basement. Bioengineering at this level is an extremely complicated process, and takes a fair amount of resources to pull it off successfully. Either you have to have a team of cutting edge geniuses or a whole lot of money, and usually both, to actually accomplish something like this." Emmi paused thoughtfully, "The Mark Two delivery method as he described is something the medical field has been working on for years, as a method of delivering targeting drugs to lung infections and cancers. The science is certainly there for that."
"But to develop a microbe that could do what Bellwether had hoped it would, why the development time alone would have been decades. Not to mention all the money needed for staff and equipment, much less the kind of laboratory you would need to prepare and culture this for mass deployment – that sort of thing can only be done by a governmental agency or a multinational corporation." Emmi paused for a moment before continuing, "I'm not a pathologist, and certainly not a bio-weapons designer. I just know how long it takes to develop drugs and treatments for neurological disorders. It's not an easy or fast process." He sat back in his chair.
Agent Daman looked over at Chief Bogo for a moment before reaching over to mute the microphone. He turned back to Chief Bogo and began speaking to him but the two doctors couldn't hear him. "What are they arguing about?" Emmi asked Hugo.
Hugo watched their lips and body language, "They seem to be arguing about giving us increased clearance? Bogo's against it, but Agent Daman seems to be adamant." Hugo sat for a moment before he explained to Emmi, "I knew that when I was brought on to the task force for the first time that I wasn't going to see all of the data. It wasn't relevant to my job in helping to find an effective treatment for the victims. Even the data that I did see had names changed and dates blanked out, and even entire sections were redacted." Hugo watched as the two other mammals of vastly different sizes argue with each other emphatically.
Bogo finally sat down heavily, giving Agent Daman a throwaway gesture, and leaned back with a resigned expression on his face. Agent Daman turned back to the microphone, a small triumphant smirk on his muzzle, and keyed it back on.
"There were millions for her to spend, Doctor Muskat. She diverted millions of bucks from the city departmental budgets to funnel into her pet projects, as well soliciting further funds from private corporations as well as other municipal governments. That's what I've come on board for; to locate where that money came from and what she was spending it on." Agent Daman explained to Emmi.
Bogo spoke up, "As for a laboratory, Doctor, development and deployment of Mark One was done out of an old subway car in the underground ZPT tunnels. We found that location three years ago during our investigation easily enough, but there was no evidence of any other programs being developed there. There simply wasn't room in the car. No, Mark Two was developed someplace else entirely, a place Mayor Bellwether simply referred to as 'The Vault'. We don't know where that is."
He took a deep breath before continuing, defeat sounding in his voice, "Nor do we have any information on the two mammals that were said to be running 'The Vault' other than their internal code-names of 'The Chemist' and 'The Tailor'. Bellwether makes no mention of their names or even a description of their appearance in her emails or memos. Obviously she assumed that the receiver understood what she was talking about. We don't."
Emmi was sitting up, concern etched on his face, "You mean this could be real?"
Bogo nodded. Agent Daman spoke up, "It's even worse than that, Doctor. After the ZPD searched the PF headquarters during their take-down raid, they discovered in among the captured documents a manifesto that Dawn had written for her followers. In that manifesto she stated that if she died prematurely or at the hands of their enemies, that her 'Heir', or her 'Favorite' as she sometimes referred to them as, would step forward and make themselves known, providing incontrovertible proof that they were Dawn's personal choice to lead the Prey First organization."
Agent Daman shook his head, "There is no further explanation or description as to this heir in the manifesto, probably because the PF members would recognize them instantly, but we had assumed that either they died in the ZPD assault on the PF headquarters, or went totally underground and disappeared, or at worst, that they have been quietly and secretly working on Dawn's agenda for the past three years."
Bogo spoke up, his voice chilled, "We've never been able to identify who that mammal is."
Emmi sat back, horror splashed across his face, "It is real. Mein Gott." He leaned over, and placed his paw on Hugo's arm, "Hugo, I so sorry for doubting you."
Hugo reached up and patted Emmi's paw, "It's alright, Emmanuel." He sat up, "And you may be right about me leaping to conclusions."
Bogo turned to look at him incredulously, "You mean that you don't believe this is evidence of Bellwether's Mark Three?"
Hugo shook his head, "Actually, what I mean by that is we don't actually know all that much about what we might be facing here. I've never seen any of the information you just told me, either about their capabilities or the political aspects. That information fundamentally changes my outlook on the events we just experienced. I am now left with many more questions than answers."
Hugo looked down at the table and then back up at them, "Night-howler as developed by Bellwether was primarily a terror weapon, deployed for political gain. It's not a mindless infectious agent seeking a host. So I have to wonder why the first evidence we have of this Mark Three program is found in a homeless goat. Is he a homeless mammal chosen for a test deployment because he is expendable? Were we supposed to discover him? Why not choose a homeless predator as target, which would have been totally in keeping with the PF political goals? Was he instead a former PF member who was infected accidentally, or as retaliation for some real or imagined sin? And that brings me to my next set of questions."
"How long has he been infected? We know for the pattern of fractures in his skull that he has repeatedly battered himself. Is that self damage indicative of periods of intermittent or continuous savage states brought on by this new application? Or is he operating in a semi savage state, and under the right stimulus he switches to a full savage episode? How long can a mammal function under those conditions?"
Hugo placed his paw on his chin, and looked back at them, "One of the political considerations that occur to me is that this particular variant may not actually be designed to provide a full savage episode, but rather to keep the mammal on the unstable edge of semi-savageness. And it that were the case, then it would make sense, politically, to deploy it to both predators and prey. For predators it would make them unpredictable, verifying the PF arguments to the pubic. And for prey it would keep them frightened and easily manipulated by the PF, who would utilize that fear to stay in power."
Hugo took a deep breath before he launched his appeal, "I'm sorry, but I need to see the raw Bellwether data, without redaction or analysis. I need to understand the PF's political objectives, the scope of their funding, and the players involved before I can formulate what was the intended impact versus the actual result of the Mark Three variant would be on mammal neurological behavior."
Bogo shot forward, "I don't think..."
Agent Daman stood in his seat, "Agreed!" He turned to Bogo, and held up his paw to forestall Bogo next objection, "I need to understand the medical issues as well as the political, and Doctor Wiedii has just show that he can analysis both. I need him to advise me on this, so as of this moment he's fully cleared." Agent Daman pointed at Hugo, "Make it happen."
Bogo froze for just a moment, his mind racing. He couldn't protect his officer from what was coming, but in hindsight Bogo was starting to think that Wilde's decision had created more problems than it solved. He sat back, considering the problem. Wilde was going to need to learn how to see past the long term consequences of his decisions if he was going to make Chief someday, and this might be the best way to do that. Besides, it's not like the cat was going to murder the fox for not telling him that his favorite pet had gone savage and died. At least he didn't the think the little doctor would do that.
"Alright, Agent Daman. I'll have Sergeant Wilde brief you on Friday morning when he gets back. I'll ask him to brief Doctor Wiedii after that. Is that soon enough?" Bogo temporized. He needed to at least warn Wilde about the avalanche that was about to land on his head.
Agent Daman turned to look back at Hugo. Hugo nodded, "Hematology and Immunology need to complete their analysis before we can be sure of what we are facing. And 24 hours will give us time to see how our patient is going to fare. Friday is fine for our purposes." He turned to look at Emmi, who nodded as well.
Emmi reached for the phone, and dialed a number. Hugo asked him, "Are you calling them?" Emmi just nodded. He spoke quickly into the phone, asking for an update. He nodded as he listened, only speaking an occasional 'Ah'. He hung up, and stood to address them all, "Good news! I just spoke with Hematology, and they can't find any trace of night-howler reaction markers in all three of our blood samples, nor do they find any evidence of the starfish pathogen either."
Bogo stood, "Can I see my officer now?" Mani nodded, and watched as Bogo strode out of the conference room. He picked up the phone to warn the ICU that Bogo was coming, make sure he was adequately protected, and that they should stand down to bio-hazard level two for the time being.
Agent Daman lingered behind just long enough to speak to Hugo, "Doctor Wiedii, I'll like to see you Friday as well, after you're done with your briefing with Sargent Wilde, alright?" Hugo nodded, and Agent Daman turned and scampered out after the bull. Hugo made a grimace as he terminated the conference call.
Emmi laid his paw on Hugo's arm, "What's with the face?"
Hugo just answered, "Wilde."
Emmi nodded, "Ah! Still can't get along with him?"
Hugo shook his head, "No. I try, for Fennick's sake, but it is hard. Wilde has gotten progressively harder and more abrupt whenever I try to talk to him, like he is trying to hide something from me. Fennick swears that he's not been corrupted by his position, but I have to wonder. Nick knows that I don't especially trust the badge he wears as it is, so his current tactic of playing the hardened cop isn't really working to make me trust him more. Some mammals just can't handle the pressures their position demand of them, I suppose."
Emmi smiled, and patted his arm, "Well, you don't have to deal with him today. Friday is soon enough." He turned to leave the room, "Come, let us give the worried cheetah officer the good news. He's got enough to worry about, what with his irritated police chief about to descend on him. And maybe we can get some answers for ourselves from him at the same time."
Hugo nodded, and followed him out of the room.
Notes:
Commonwealth Interpol Special Agent Daman, or Chỉ Dãman, if you must know his full birth name, is a Annamite Striped Rabbit from the Vietnam highlands. Look them up! They are beautiful gold rabbits with black markings.