The last infection was minor this time, but I wasn’t sure how it would affect my other health problems.\u00a0 My eyes were still fuzzy from the virus, and the lesions on my legs were still pretty painful from the bacterial infection I had a couple weeks ago.\u00a0 I was not sure if I was going to be able to keep pulling my time in the lab.\u00a0 Every time I picked up a sample, I somehow picked up a lesser version of the same illness.\u00a0 I followed lab protocols, I double gloved, wore a splatter shield with a breathing mask and eye protection.\u00a0 My coveralls were always new and my apron was the heaviest gauge I could lift.\u00a0 But somehow, every time, I got sick.\u00a0 As if proximity was enough.\u00a0 Considering very few of the pathogens I worked with were even communicable, at least over the air, it was an impossible thing.\u00a0 No one else in my lab became ill.<\/p>\n
I am probably the worst hypochondriac in the world.<\/p>\n
…And I was quickly coming to the conclusion that working in the CDC was probably a death sentence.\u00a0 Psychosomatic illness with lesions and symptoms is a real feat!\u00a0 I should be in a record book somewhere.\u00a0\u00a0 Study measles, I get a strain of something that looks like measles.\u00a0 Study pox, I get something that looks like pox.\u00a0 You get the idea.<\/p>\n
So why am I writing this down?\u00a0\u00a0 Why am I documenting the odd conditions that I find myself in?\u00a0 Well the next sample that I am assigned to study is a very strange one indeed.\u00a0 I have been reading the encounter team notes, and to say the least, this one is odd.\u00a0 It is a virus from Brazil, communicated into the village by one of their hunting parties.\u00a0 They were unsure of where they contracted the virus on their foray into the jungle, but they had come back with a particularly nasty little friend.\u00a0 It wasn’t deadly to most, but ended up culling about 10% of the population in the village, usually the eldest.\u00a0 It is labelled N54-220, and it exhibited very powerful flu like symptoms in most cases, including vomiting, diarrhea, fever, chills, muscle spasms, seizures, and occasional memory loss.\u00a0 What is interesting about N54-220 is the fact that it didn’t just cull 10% of the weaker, older people, it improved another completely distinct sample, roughly 5% of the village.<\/p>\n
For example, out of 100 people, 10 died, and 5 became healthier.\u00a0 Not just more healthy… they appeared to be younger, faster, stronger.\u00a0 One 35 year old man, Patient S, was able to pull entire trees out of the ground.\u00a0 Not just small little saplings, but full size mature trees.\u00a0 He was able to jump over rivers that required bridges, he was able to lift boulders that five men would struggle to roll.\u00a0 A superman.\u00a0 A very short, very powerful, tanned tribesman in the middle of the rainforest.\u00a0 Weird, right?<\/p>\n
I wanted to start this log of my personal activities as I studied N54-220.\u00a0 For the world’s worst hypochondriac disease researcher in the CDC, what were my chances of picking this sample up and having it affect me?<\/p>\n
Hypothesis:\u00a0 I will study N54-220 and I will experience flu like symptoms which will result in death, normalcy, or… superman.\u00a0 Or, nothing will happen, because I am a damn hypochondriac and will be following infectious disease protocols.<\/p>\n
Day 1.\u00a0 I am sitting at my bench, using my headset with the audio recorder on my phone, under all my gear. I have the sample in the hotbox, vialed up in a suspension isolate.\u00a0 Today, I move the samples to dishes for growth and propagation study.\u00a0 I have my transfer syringes, moving the samples to the dishes and the sequencing kit. So far, no affects noted.\u00a0 No breach in protocols, with a clean transfer.<\/p>\n
Day 2.\u00a0 I woke up feeling ill. My back hurt and I was achy.\u00a0 I came into the lab to review the results at my computer station.\u00a0 I will stay out of the hot lab today.\u00a0 Not taking chances.\u00a0 Paperwork today, if I feel better tomorrow, I will suit up.<\/p>\n
Day 3.\u00a0 Definitely sick.\u00a0 Called in.\u00a0 Again.\u00a0 I am going to get fired for the rate I burn up sick time.\u00a0 Getting fired from a government job takes some real commitment. Ha.<\/p>\n
Day 3, entry 2.\u00a0 Woke up from nap with seizure.\u00a0 Pissed all over my bed and floor.\u00a0 Spent 20 minutes cleaning it all up and then took a shower.\u00a0\u00a0 Feel worse.<\/p>\n
Day 3, entry 3.\u00a0 The diarrhea and vomiting started.\u00a0 Cleaning out GI tract seems to be prime directive of illness.<\/p>\n
Day 5.\u00a0 Have not been able to move until today.\u00a0 Crawled out of bed, into shower, drank my body weight in water, crawled back to bed.\u00a0 Try to enter log tomorrow.<\/p>\n
Day 6.\u00a0 Woke up feeling much better.\u00a0 Fever must have broke last night.\u00a0 But that is not the interesting thing.\u00a0 I had a dream about my hypochondria.\u00a0 In my dream, I floated up out of myself, and was able to inspect my own fevered body with cold precision.\u00a0 I analyzed my body, clinically documenting my condition in an abstract way, like one talks about the weather or the condition of a worn deck.\u00a0 I looked down into my cells and noted that I was a mutant of sorts, able to infer biological conditions from my environment as a survival mechanism.\u00a0 My immunological response was to emulate the biological contaminant before it made me a host.\u00a0 I had the world’s first proactive immune system.\u00a0 I wondered at it, watching my immune system build strange proteins and RNA strands, and letting the results run rampant, only to be trounced by the very system that deployed them.\u00a0 What a strange dream!\u00a0 It felt real.\u00a0\u00a0 I feel so good I should be able to return to work tomorrow.<\/p>\n
Day 7.\u00a0 I returned to work, feeling healthy and happy, and found my samples sequenced with the reports awaiting my review.\u00a0 I dove in.\u00a0 The pathogen N54-220 was a virus payload, related to the influenza virus strain that came out of China this year.\u00a0 It shared a significant amount of payload material, but I could not determine anything outstanding from the results that would explain the observed behavior in the wild.\u00a0\u00a0 In a moment of playfulness, remembering my dream from yesterday, I grabbed the edge of the worktable I was at and twisted my hand up to see what would happen.\u00a0 I bent the table. Twisted the metal lip almost a full 45 degrees. It felt like a twisting a twist tie on a bag of bread.\u00a0 I pushed it back, giddy.<\/p>\n
Day 7, entry 2.\u00a0 I went to the gym today.\u00a0 I have never been to a gym in my life, so I tried the Y.\u00a0 All the free weights scared me a bit, so I headed to the machines.\u00a0 Bench press was first.\u00a0 I put the stack at 100lbs and pushed it up without any effort.\u00a0\u00a0 I bumped the weight by 50 lbs and tried again.\u00a0 No effort.\u00a0 I bumped the weight another 50lbs, tried again.\u00a0 Same result.\u00a0\u00a0 I maxed out the machine at 220 lbs and did not even struggle.\u00a0 I moved to the free weights, asked a couple larger guys for some tips and how to measure the weights.\u00a0 They looked at my razor thin frame, all 150lbs of it, pasty white skin, and smiled at the “nerd” while they explained it all.\u00a0 One guy laughed when I loaded the bench bar with four 45lb plates on each side.\u00a0 Then they shut up when I busted out 10 repetitions.\u00a0 I was too conspicuous.\u00a0 I won’t go back.\u00a0 I need to study this away from curious eyes.<\/p>\n
Day 8.\u00a0 Work went well today.\u00a0 I studied three new arrivals without much fear or worry.\u00a0 I don’t know why.\u00a0 I feel… different.<\/p>\n
Day 9.\u00a0 I went out for a run today.\u00a0 I have never ran a mile in my life.\u00a0 In high school, I always had a doctor’s note. Today I ran at least 20 miles.\u00a0 I did it in a single hour.\u00a0 That clocks out to a 3 minute mile.\u00a0 I felt like I could run faster… when I was done, I was sweating, but not uncomfortable or feeling ill.\u00a0 I think I laughed all the way home.<\/p>\n
Day 10.\u00a0 All my symptoms and illnesses are gone.\u00a0 My skin is clear, the lesions are completely healed.\u00a0 My muscle mass appears to be unchanged, although my body weight has increased by forty pounds.\u00a0\u00a0 I feel as if I look the same in the mirror.<\/p>\n
Day 15.\u00a0 I spent the last week testing my limits.\u00a0 I do have them, but they are hard to reach.\u00a0 I think I need to go to Brazil. The desire came on me suddenly today.\u00a0 I feel a compulsion to meet the others.\u00a0 To… talk to them.\u00a0 I don’t know why.\u00a0 I filed a field request with my supervisor, but I am leaving regardless.\u00a0 My flight heads out in three days.\u00a0 I am packing everything I need and donating the rest.\u00a0 I feel like I am not coming back.<\/p>\n
Day 18.\u00a0 This is my last entry in America.\u00a0 Brazil or bust!<\/p>\n
Day 20.\u00a0 I rode the bus to the final point I could from the airport.\u00a0 I hired a guide in the local village, Tom.\u00a0 (If his name is actually Tom, I would be surprised.)\u00a0 But he speaks English and knows where I want to head.\u00a0\u00a0 My CDC badge has gotten to the right places so far, I am trusting Tom to take me the rest of the way on foot.\u00a0 He estimates about a day and a half to the village I am looking for.\u00a0 We are starting our hike early tomorrow morning into the rainforest.<\/p>\n
Day 22.\u00a0 We walked all the way alright.\u00a0 I arrived feeling fit and healthy.\u00a0 Tom was amazed that I handled the hike so readily.\u00a0 I waved it off.\u00a0 Waiting on the path, about five minutes from the village, we met Caua. I felt as if I knew him.\u00a0 Tom helped translate with Caua… he knew I was close, he could feel another “Sobre” close by.\u00a0 I could not get a translation from Tom of what Sobre meant.\u00a0 In Spanish, it was a preposition meaning ‘upon’.\u00a0 I did not press it with Caua.\u00a0 There are seven Sobre in the village and I was to join them.\u00a0 Caua sent Tom back home and took me under his care.<\/p>\n
Day 23.\u00a0 Tomorrow Caua and the other Sobre are going to take me into the bush.\u00a0 We all feel the pull.\u00a0 The jungle calls us.\u00a0 We yearn to go.\u00a0 The Sobre will not be coming back, they are giving their belongings to others in the Village.\u00a0 I hear it now… the song.\u00a0 It pulls on me, caresses me.\u00a0 It sings a call to action, a call home.\u00a0 It is getting stronger, every moment.\u00a0 The jungle calls us.\u00a0 The jungle… is asking us to be something more.\u00a0 And I am the key.\u00a0 I am the key to saving everything.<\/p>\n
This will be my last entry.\u00a0 I don’t know why… but the sense of immense purpose makes me calm.\u00a0 I am not worried about what the future holds, because I will be making it.\u00a0 That sounds crazy, doesn’t it?<\/p>\n
Maybe.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The last infection was minor this time, but I wasn’t sure how it would affect my other health problems.\u00a0 My eyes were still fuzzy from the virus, and the lesions on my legs were still …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"webmentions_disabled_pings":false,"webmentions_disabled":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-136","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-short-story","category-writing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/discardme.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/discardme.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/discardme.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/discardme.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/discardme.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=136"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/discardme.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":170,"href":"https:\/\/discardme.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136\/revisions\/170"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/discardme.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=136"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/discardme.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=136"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/discardme.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=136"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}