Case File 21 - When There Should Have Been Apple Pie

Part 3 of 4

If you’re just joining the tale, you might want to jump back to part 1 first.

After stashing the Space Chew candy in an outside pocket of my hazmat suit, I put it on. I ventured out past the decontamination station, through an airlock and into the orchard dome. In the centre of the trees, I could just make out the colonists standing around the pond. How much time did they have? I bit my lip and turned towards the residential area. 

Even though I felt guilty about it, I skipped past the building housing Ned—to save him, I needed to hunt down answers, not join his pity party. But how much time did he have until he turned into a zombie like the rest? I swallowed and tried not to think too hard about it.

Behind the daycare and at the end of a row of townhomes sat unit 21C. Exotic pathogens aside, it looked like a nice place to raise a family. I knocked on the front door—I needed the boy to open up to me, and I didn’t want to scare him off by barging in.

A few moments later, the door slid open a hand’s width. A gas mask covered face at the height of my elbow looked out.

“David?” I asked crouching down to look the boy in the eye through my own face mask. “I’m Detective Ruben.”

“Am I in trouble?” He didn’t open the door any further. As he spoke, his mask fogged up, obscuring his face.

“No, I just want to ask you a few questions.”

“That’s detective code for I’m in trouble,” he said. “I’ve seen the shows.”

“How about you just call me Flo and I promise you aren’t in trouble. I just want to help your mom and the others that live in this dome. Can you help me help them?” I put on the same indulgent smile I had used on my boys when they were David’s age, and hoped he could see it through our masks.

He paused for a moment as though in deep thought. “Okay.” he said, just as I started debating pushing my way in. The boy nodded and backed away.

The door slid fully open, and I stepped inside. Suppressing my feeling of guilt around walking into this boy’s home wearing boots, I followed him into the open plan living/dining room and kitchen. Knick-knacks, ornate boxes, strange vases, and other stuff cluttered every horizontal surface. A three-panelled display that could only be a science fair project sat on the dining room table. It appeared to be the only recent addition to the mess.

A moving painting of elephants hanging on the far wall drew my attention and I walked closer to watch the huge beasts interact around a muddy pond. On a shelf below the painting sat an elephant tusk, I’d seen one before back on the station. As I reach out to touch it (with my gloved hand), David interrupted me.

“Mom just brought that back from the station,” he said pointing at the tusk. “I’m not supposed to touch items from her collection.”

“Does she bring stuff back from Indigo Station often?” I asked while wondering where the line was between collection and horde.

“Yeah. I asked her to bring me back a cat, but she said they don’t exist anymore.” He let out a long sigh. “She brought me an ant farm instead.”

“So, you aren’t a fan of ants?” I resumed snooping around. 

He shrugged. “They’re okay. It’s just that mom...” He slumped down onto the couch and caved in on himself. “I can’t hide it anymore, it’s me who should be in trouble.” 

I sat beside him. “Why do you say that?”

“It’s all my fault.” David took off his gas mask before I could stop him. 

“Put it back on.” I grabbed the mask out of his hands and started orientating the straps above his head.

He stood and faced me. With a sniff, he wiped a tear from his eye. 

“There’s a pathogen, clearly this gas mask is keeping you safe, you need to put it back on right now.”

He shook his head. “I wasn’t wearing it before... when mom started acting strange.”

Still holding the mask, I lowered my hands down to my lap. “When did your mom start acting strange?”

“When she opened the lid to my cricket colony,” he said as he wiped another tear away. “She had been so proud of me.”

“Was it the science fair project?” I pointed to where it sat on the kitchen table. 

He nodded. “I won first place. I get to go to the station for system finals.”

“Can I look at the project?”

David wrapped his arms around himself and said nothing. Taking that for consent, I put his mask down and went over to his project.

“Transferring O. unilateralis fungal parasite between species,” I read the title aloud. “This sounds awfully technical, can you explain what you did?”

He shrugged. “The ants my mom brought me were infected with a fungus that turned them into zombies. I transferred that fungus to the crickets.”

Studying the hand drawn and colourful boards, I stood before the science fair project as though it was an alter. This had to be it! Could a fungus that jumped from ants to crickets, jump to us? Why didn’t it infect David?

David sat and opened a roll of candy. As he chewed, he explained in detail about the fungus and what it did to ants and now to crickets.

“Flo,” said Ned over my in-ear comms device. I could hear he was chewing something—probably more Space Chews. He had devoured at least one whole package on the shuttle ride down here.

“Hey, buddy. How are you doing?” I winced at my over-the-top tone of concern. Not once had I ever called him ‘buddy’. Thankfully, Ned didn’t call me out on it.

“I feel the same,” he said, and I felt myself relax just a little bit. “Just wondering how things are going. I’m getting kinda bored.”

“Well, I’ve checked out David’s science fair project.”

“A science fair project… how does that fit?”

I could picture Ned pulling his eyebrows together as he tried to puzzle out what I was talking about. Being as brief as possible, I explained the project to Ned. Once done, I glanced over to the boy. He was already half-way through his pack of candy. At the rate people devoured this candy, I regretted not buying shares of Space Chew.

“Hey David, how long did it take from when your mom was exposed to your project until she started acting weird,” I asked leaving the comms link to Ned open.

He shrugged. “I don’t know, twenty minutes or so.”

“Twenty minutes?” I heard Ned spring to his feet. “Hell, I’ve been here over two hours and still feel like myself.”

“So both you and David appear immune.” I studied the boy. What did the two of them have in common? I crossed my arms over my chest while staring at the science fair project.

“Maybe, David isn’t infected because he’s spent time working with the ants and crickets,” suggested Ned. “Developed some kind of fungal-immunity.”

“Are you naturally anti-fungal?” I asked.

“No idea,” he said and we all fell silent. Ned left the line open and I heard the sound of him unwrapping more candy then putting it in his mouth. 

As I watched David do the same thing a connection hits me. “Ned how much candy have you had?”

“My husband gave me five packages,” Ned said. “He thinks the new flavour is going to run out quickly and he wanted to make sure I had a good supply.”

“The Rainbow Starfield flavour?” I asked.

David perked up and held up the glittery package of his Space Chews. “I love that flavour. My mom brought back a box of it from her last trip to the station.”

“What if the candy is rendering you both immune?” I asked pulling out the roll of candy I’d stashed in my pocket. I ran my fingers along the glittery rainbows on a silver backing. Was it even possible that something in the candy could be responsible? Hoping she wouldn’t laugh at my theory, I called Dr. Vega.

To be continued…