Feeding frenzy, p.7
Feeding Frenzy, page 7
“Food and Drug Association,” called Remo. “Open up.”
“You mean Administration.”
“Have it your way. Who are you?”
“Centers for Disease Control and I’m busier than a one-armed paperhanger in here.”
“How come you’re the only one?”
“Because I have a public to protect. Those other idiots are just concerned about turf, ink, and their reputations.”
“Then you’re exactly the person we want to talk to and we’re coming in.”
The man was on the rotund side with squinty eyes behind big glasses. He did not look entirely pleased to see them, but after a few moments his more genial side came through.
“I’m Dale Parsons with the CDC,” he said.
“Remo Salk.”
Parsons blinked. “Any relation?”
“My mother’s cousin’s father’s son,” said Remo, who had gotten the name off the ID card.
“So what’s the FDA’s interest in HELP?” Parsons wondered, eyeing Remo’s casual black T-shirt and matching chinos.
“There’s a California candy company looking to market chocolate-covered thunderbugs and we gotta approve it as safe.”
“Only in America...”
There was not much in the way of equipment inside the tent. A folding card table, racks of test tubes and specimen bottles and test equipment Remo did not recognize. Not that there was much in the way of test equipment he would recognize.
There was an array of covered petri dishes on the table, and each of them was dotted with sluggish bugs that reminded Remo of elongated ladybugs, but without the pleasant orange coloration. These bugs were mud-colored.
“Are these the terrible insects of doom?” asked Chiun.
Parsons seemed to notice the Master of Sinanju for the first time.
“Friend of yours?” he asked Remo.
“Japanese beetle expert,” said Remo without thinking.
Chiun puffed out his wrinkled cheeks. His eggshell-colored face began turning a smoky red.
“That is, Chiun’s an expect on Japanese beetles,” Remo said hastily. “Not a Japanese who’s a beetle expert. He’s very sensitive about that. He’s actually Korean.”
Parsons’s eyebrows lifted. “My father served in Korea.”
“So did my father,” said Chiun aridly.
That made Parsons laugh and the tension went out of the air.
Parsons said, “If these things are related to Japanese beetles, it’s news to me. But I’m not an expert on bugs. I specialize in food-transmitted diseases and this has me stumped.”
“What can you tell us?” Remo prompted.
“Well, it’s not an autoimmune disease. Whether or not it’s a virus, I’m not ready to say. But there are already thirty dead and not much time to get to the bottom of it if this is another AIDS.”
“Are you saying it’s like AIDS?”
“Well, HELP is like AIDS in that its chief symptom is a wholesale wasting of the victim’s body. No question of that. Whether it’s a virus, or if it is a virus of the same family as AIDS, is another matter. But it has the potential to be very dangerous.”
“Only if people eat bugs, right?”
“If it is Ingraticus Avalonicus that’s causing it.”
“You think it isn’t?”
“I can’t say either way. I do know that viral infections are hard to get from eating an infected host. Often, the stomach acids destroy a virus before it can be absorbed into the system.”
“Then it’s not the bug?”
“Well, it could be. These people handle the thunderbugs before they eat them. They could become infected in the food preparation process. Or if they chew the raw bugs while they have a cut or sore in the mouth. It all depends on what my tests determine.”
Chiun was examining a petri dish critically. The thunderbugs under the glass stood about like contented buggy sheep.
“They look too lazy to be dangerous,” he murmured.
“They don’t have a lot of energy, that’s for sure.”
“Maybe they’re sick,” said Remo.
“They are the wrong color to be dangerous,” Chiun said.
“What do you mean?” asked Parsons.
“Venomous creatures always show their true colors. This bug is neither as green as an adder nor blue as blue cheese.”
Dale Parsons cocked an eyebrow. “Blue cheese is venomous?”
The Master of Sinanju waggled a remonstrating finger. “Blue is a color not appropriate for food. Avoid blue cheese as you would the pit viper or the scorpion. No good can come from any of these things.”
“You’re talking about naturally venomous insects,” said Parsons. “This is different. This is a disease the thunderbug may have picked up somewhere and is simply a carrier of, much the way deer ticks carry Lyme disease, which is caused by a spirochete, not a virus, by the way.”
“But this bug has no teeth,” Chiun pointed out.
“Well, HELP is getting into these PAPA idiots’ systems somehow. And this has the potential to be worse than AIDS.”
“Yeah?” said Remo.
“Absolutely. With AIDS, you get HIV–Human Immunodeficiency Virus–and then maybe a few years later, it blossoms into full-blown Advanced Immune Deficiency Syndrome, putting the sufferer at risk for contracting fatal cancers or flus. Nobody really dies of AIDS, you know. They die of illnesses they contract because AIDS makes them more susceptible. Here, people get HELP and they’re dead in forty-eight hours with no sign of any primary illness or secondary infection.”
“But that means they’re contagious for only a little while, right?”
“If they’re contagious. And if they’re getting HELP from the bug, and they don’t stop eating bugs, it doesn’t much matter. More are going to die. And bug eating is a fad now. Kids are doing it all over the country as a dare.”
Remo frowned. “Then we’re back to the bugs again.”
Parsons shrugged. “A lot of them eat bugs. Only a few have died. As soon as I’ve got my centrifuge and electron microscope set up, I’m going to talk to the local coroner who performed the first HELP autopsies. I’m a pathologist, but I’m not licensed to autopsy people in this state.”
The honking of horns suddenly blared all around them.
“Now what?” muttered Remo, going to the tent flap.
Reporters, both print and electronic, were running hither and yon.
Remo reached out and arrested a running sound man. He lifted him off his feet and his feet kept running. Remo recognized him as the human bone he had thrown to Jane Goodwoman.
“I see you survived,” Remo said dryly.
“Is it usually that messy?” the boy asked.
“After Jane Goodwoman, all women are downhill.”
“That’s a relief.”
“Now that I’ve started you along the road to wisdom, who’s coming up the road?”
“Senator Ned J. Clancy.”
Remo blinked. “Why? Did someone declare this an open bar zone?”
“I don’t know.”
Remo dropped the man and his feet got in gear again.
“This place is about to become a zoo,” Remo told Chiun.
“It is already a zoo.”
“It is about to become the zoo of all time. Let’s mosey.” Remo stuck his head back in the tent. “We’ll catch up with you later.”
Dale Parsons didn’t look up from his work. “I’ll be here.”
The rush of press was heading south so Remo and Chiun struck off to the west toward the main PAPA encampment.
Over the sound of feet and the honking of horns they could hear Jane Goodwoman calling frantically, “Where is Senator Clancy? Where is Senator Clancy?”
Remo raised his voice. “Go east about a hundred yards. You can’t miss him.”
Chiun said, “The one they are rushing to meet is to the south.”
Remo grinned. “I know. But the latrine is about a hundred yards to the east. Maybe she’ll fall in.”
“You are in a mean mood.”
“You would be too if she tried to jump your bones.”
“My bones would jump back and her bones would be broken,” Chiun sniffed.
“I’ll count on you to throw yourself between us next time she goes into heat,” Remo said wryly.
· · ·
In the main encampment, they came upon a group of hippie types sitting in the weeds and picking tiny bugs off themselves. They sat under staked umbrellas and buckskin hides stretched over wood frames, presumably to protect them from cancerous ultraviolet rays, Remo decided.
Their approach was noticed, and a bony woman raised a thin hand and waved them to come closer.
“Peace! Come to join the wave of the future?”
“Why not?” said Remo.
“Never,” said Chiun.
Remo hissed, “We’re supposed to get to the bottom of this. So we’re joining these dips.”
“We are joining, but I am not eating bugs.”
“Fine. Just follow along.”
“Are you Snappers or are you Harvesters?” someone asked.
“What are you people?” Remo countered.
“Snappers. Look.” And the bony woman plucked one of the tiny bugs off a weed and snapped its head off with the flick of a dirty thumbnail. She put the rest in her mouth and began chewing. She chewed soundlessly for over a minute and finally a smile came over her face. It had been preceded by a tiny crunch. “Got the little bugger.”
“They still move after they’re decapitated so you have to find them with your teeth,” someone said helpfully.
“That’s the fun part,” added a thin man wearing a Coptic cross and shorts that fought to hold on to his skinny hips.
“How do they taste?” wondered Remo.
“Like lobster.”
“No, like Cajun popcorn,” a man insisted.
“Like fried rice,” said someone else.
“Are you all eating the same bug?” Remo asked.
“We don’t call it a bug. It’s Miracle Food. You can eat them all day long and never get full, or get tired of them.”
“They come in different flavors too.”
“Are you not concerned that you will sicken and die?” Chiun demanded.
“Only Harvesters catch HELP.”
“Yeah, that’s because they’re too white and don’t cover themselves when they go out into the sun.”
Everyone agreed that the Harvester sect of the People Against Protein Assassins caught Human Environmental Liability Paradox. In fact, the Snapper group looked reasonably healthy. A number of them were pretty skinny, but it was diet-skinny, not wasting-away-to-skin-and-bones skinny.
“Then we’d better check out the Harvesters,” Remo told Chiun.
A man shucked a handful of thunderbugs off a weed and offered them to Remo.
“Here, man. Take a bunch. It’s a long walk.”
“Yeah,” a young girl said, “and over on the other side of the Schism Line, they cook all the flavor out of the little fellows.”
“No thanks,” said Remo. “Bug sushi doesn’t appeal to me.”
“Harvester,” the young girl hissed. “If you catch HELP, it’ll be your own fault.”
They left the Snappers to their snapping and snacking.
· · ·
The Schism Line proved to be exactly that. Someone had dragged a stick across the vale and there was a wooden sign stuck into it. On the approach side it said SNAPPER TURF. When they passed it, the other side of the sign said HAPPY HARVESTER HUNTING GROUND.
The tepees and wigwams were all clustered on the other side of the Schism Line.
They were arrayed around a campfire that was ringed with stones. There was a pot simmering. As they approached, Remo and Chiun saw people come to ladle in thunderbugs, wait a few moments, and ladle them out again.
There seemed to be a continual procession of PAPA adherents coming to contribute to the communal pot and then return to partake. Nobody looked sick. Nobody looked particularly well fed either. They wore Indian costumes that might have once fit them, but the buckskin and beads now fit loosely, if at all.
Remo walked up to the pot and asked, “How can you tell if they’re cooked if you’re cooking them all together like that?”
A man looked up. “They cook fast. They’re always good. That’s why Gitchee Manitou created them.”
Remo frowned. “I’ve heard of the shores of Gitchee Goomie. But who’s Gitchee Manitou?”
“The Great Spirit who created the thunderbug and sowed them in the fields with their plump bodies that are good to eat and their tiny legs which cannot run fast so they don’t get away. Look, see how they can’t wait to be eaten.”
Remo and Chiun looked. The lethargic thunderbugs, once they were held over the steaming pot, came to life. They leapt from the ladles and into the simmering water, where they immediately curled up in tiny chickpealike balls.
“I never heard of bugs committing mass suicide,” said Remo.
“It is not suicide. They only want to share themselves with us. When it is our turn to die, we will go to a place where man is tiny and thunderbugs are great and we will return the favor by allowing them to consume our tasty flesh.”
“Who fed you this bulldookie?” Remo said.
“Theodore Soars-With-Eagles.”
“Where do we find him?”
“Sometimes he is in the wind and cannot be seen, only felt.”
Remo reached down to find the man’s neck. He squeezed. “Can the corn.”
“We call it maize.”
“I call it bullshit. Where is he now?”
“Sometimes he can be found napping in his tepee,” the man said through teeth that seemed suddenly welded together.
“Point us.”
The man had only a ladle to point with and he swept it back around, throwing hot broth and dead thunderbugs into the parched grass.
When Remo released him, he dived for the bugs and began popping them into his mouth.
· · ·
“Welcome, brothers in nature,” said Theodore Soars-With-Eagles when they pushed aside the flap of his tent. It was made of some slick material that Remo thought he recognized.
“Naugahyde?” he asked.
Theodore Soars-With-Eagles gathered his chinchilla cloak about his shoulders. “Gitchee Manitou invented what the white man came to call Naugahyde. In his great wisdom he has seen fit not to enforce the patent. It is called reciprocity.”
“The tribal language around here is obviously bullshit,” Remo growled. “You started this cult?”
“There is some disagreement over that. Some say Brother Karl Sagacious, may his noble Greek soul forever rest, founded PAPA. Some give me that honor. Some say we were brothers in creation before our unfortunate misunderstanding.”
“Some say you had everything to gain from his death,” said Remo.
“Such talk slanders the proud name of the People Against Protein Assassins. My ancestors refused to slaughter the proud beefalo for food. How could I harm my fellow man?”
“We just came from the Snappers,” said Remo.
Theodore Soars-With-Eagles shook his feathered head sadly. Remo noticed that his bald spot was gone, and his hair moved a half second behind his headdress.
“Poor misguided ones. Gitchee Manitou weeps every time they bite off the head of one of his children.”
“According to them, only your side is suffering from HELP.”
“A lie. It is only them.”
“When we got here, we saw you lead a funeral service.”
“The committing of clay to clay. But when one of our number dies we put aside all disagreement and I preside over the ceremony of ashes.”
“I didn’t see any cremation going on,” Remo said.
“We buried three Snappers today. They have been returned to the good earth, never to be seen again. They are ashes.”
“They are on their way to your well,” said Remo. “Look, we want some straight answers.”
“It is only the white skins who speak with false tongues.”
“That is a good start,” said Chiun, nodding approvingly. “Speaking the obvious truth.”
“Stay out of this, Little Father.”
“When you are in my tepee,” Theodore Soars-With-Eagles said indignantly, “you will treat my yellow brother as you would me.”
“Listen, you–” Remo started to say.
Just then a girl in braided pigtails poked her head in and said, “Brother Theodore! Senator Clancy has come to Nirvana West!”
Brother Theodore Soars-With-Eagles took off his Navajo blanket, revealing a “Made in Japan” tag.
“Senator Clancy is here? I knew he would come. Whenever there is need, the great senator from Massachusetts arrives on the wings of the Thunderbird.”
“I think he came in a limo,” growled Remo.
“I must go to him. We will parley. There is much we have in common. We are both men of the people.”
“Bring your own booze,” said Remo, letting the man go.
They watched him lope off in his buckskin breeches.
“We are getting nowhere,” Chiun said thinly.
“That’s because we are nowhere,” Remo complained. “We’re going to have to grab Eagles when there aren’t so many people around.”
“Long have I dwelt in this land, Remo. There are times when its size and greatness have reminded me of the Rome of the Caesars. We worked for the Caesars and although they were white, they were good to work for.”
“America hasn’t exactly been shy with its gold,” Remo pointed out.
“True, but in the days of Rome only the Caesars were crazy. Here, it is the subjects who are the maddest.”
“There I can’t disagree, Little Father. With all the beef we have in this country, we’ve got people who are eating bugs.”
A disgusted look came over the Master of Sinanju’s face.
“Who would eat the dead meat of cows?” he sniffed. “I mean, with such a wonderful range of good-tasting bugs, who would eat an insignificant thing like this lazy dunderbug?”
Remo stared.
“Of course,” Chiun added in a lofty voice, “I do not eat bugs. But if lesser creatures wish to eat bugs, should they not eat the best bugs?”
Someone overheard him and said, “Bugs are the next rice.”
