The Plum Island Conspiracy — Part 1

Series — Bent on exposing the secret sale of an old laboratory, journalist Calvin Noble partners with one of the only employees who worked there, and lived to tell the tale.

Photo by Natalie Comrie on Unsplash

After an investigative piece of mine inadvertently — though not unfairly — embarrassed the wrong person, my boss stuck me with the “Crazy Pile.” These were community story tips that sounded either implausible, or downright impossible. Of course, someone had to look through them, or else risk getting beat on a good scoop. The job was mostly a waste of time. But some of those stories that turned out to be true, were truly horrifying.

Such was the case with what Samuel Piper witnessed one chilly August evening back in 2011.

“Thank you again for agreeing to meet with me,” I said. I smile politely. One of my hands was wrapped around a chipped souvenir mug. The other held a pen eagerly over my notebook. I had another sip of coffee and looked across the table at Samuel.

“Of course,” he replied with a nod. “Thank you coming here. I don’t like diving into the details in public. What exactly do you know about Plum Island?”

“Bout as much as anyone else on the North Fork, I suppose. Been by it a few times on the Orient Point Ferry. I know DHS watches over it, and I know it’s damn near impossible for a journalist to get on shore.”

Samuel gave an approving nod. “Place is just secret enough to breed conspiracy theories. I’ve heard the local talk; theories about two-headed deer, gene experiments and such. If they knew the truth, they’d be rioting in the streets, demanding the military firebomb the whole place before it kills us all.”

I fidgeted in my seat. At this point, I hadn’t quite made up my mind about the man’s story, but I was leaning toward crazy, rather than plausible. “How do you know so much about the island?”

“I used to work there,” Samuel explained. “Security detail, back before Homeland took over.”

“What was it like working there?” I pried.

“Can’t say much,” he shrugged. “They made me sign a million ‘n a half nondisclosure agreements.”

“You can tell me,” I urged. “Legally speaking, I mean. There’s nothing a court could compel you to do to make me give you up as my source if you want to stay off the record.”

“Off the record then?” Samuel asked.

I nodded.

“Well like I said, I never worked in the laboratory. There’s a separate building just across the island; old Coast Guard Station, I think. We’d stay in three-day shifts, ‘stead of shuttling back and forth to the mainland every damn day.”

“And what did you actually do as a guard if you weren’t in the laboratory?” I inquired.

“Kept watch for loose animals. Wasn’t much we could do about birds, but land animals were absolutely forbidden. Not much lives out there except squirrels these days, I’d expect. But back then, there were plenty of deer.”

“And what would you do when you found them?”

“Shot ‘em dead, dragged ‘em back to the station, and burned them in the incinerator. Every last one,” He explained. Samuel tapped his fingers on the table and starred vacantly at the wall behind me for a moment. “Unless it was raining – or the animal was in or near the water. Sometimes deer try to swim out from the mainland.” He added.

I raised my eyebrow and asked, “Why is that? Seems like a lot of extra trouble.”

“The boys in the lab were paranoid about blood getting in the water. Matter of fact, they were paranoid about the water in general. Every damn drain in the place led to a boiler. Had to be purified before it left the facility.”

“Were they worried something from the lab would contaminate animals back on Long Island, or the mainland?” I asked.

Samuel nodded. “They seemed especially fixated on deer. You live on Long Island, so I don’t have to tell you what a pain they are. If something ever piggy backed off Plum Island, it’d be up and down the whole East Coast in a month. Probably jump to other animals too, maybe even humans.”

“Makes sense,” I replied. “Not to side track you here, but when you called, you said this was about Prop 12; the plan to let the city sell the island off.”

“I’m getting to that,” he waved his hand dismissively. “But to understand, you need to know what happened my last night on the job. It was my turn to pull an overnight shift in one of the tree stands, checking for animals. Hurricane Irene was set to make landfall, and it was raining so hard you’d think the sky was falling…”

I set down my coffee, took up my pen, and began to write.

August 2011
Watchtower 5 — Plum Island

Samuel pulled his coat zipper all the way up to his collar, and cinched down the elastic ties to pull his hood tight around his head. There were only two buildings on the island, and the dirt roads that ran between them and the docks were unlit. He supposed the boys in the lab – as he called them – didn’t want mainlanders getting a glimpse at what went on in the night. To ensure the patrolmen would actually be able to see, they were all equipped with night vision goggles, courtesy of the DHS.

Samuel’s tree stand swayed in the tropical storm-force winds, which had just reached Plum Island. He’d made doubly sure to secure it, adding a few extra lashings with some parachute cord from the outpost. Bored, soaked, and miserable, Samuel marked the grueling hours by pacing, scanning the horizon for glowing animal eyes, and cradling his tranquilizer rifle.

In his entire career on the island, he’d shot a few dozen deer and knocked out a handful more with his CapChur Special Issue. So, when he saw the familiar outline of a buck – colored a radioactive green by the glow of his night vision goggles – Samuel was surprised, but not alarmed. He pulled the butt of the gun into his shoulder, rested his cheek on the stock, peered through the scope, and waited.

Through streams of water trickling down over the lens, Samuel could tell the deer was by the water’s edge, about a football field’s length away. Out of range. He needed to wait for the animal to move closer before trying a take-down. Samuel worked hard to get his breathing under control, and stay silent. The absolute nightmare worst-case scenario was spooking the deer, causing it to run back into the water. If that happened, he would have to run back to the station, grab a few other guards, and chase after the animal in their zodiac. The prospect of a late-night search during the storm did not excite Samuel.

He continued to wait patiently as the deer milled around. After what felt like hours, the animal moved away from the beach, onto the grass by the edge of the forest where Samuel was perched. At 40 yards, the buck was just at the edge of the gun’s range. At about 20, he lined up his shot and squeezed the trigger.

The tranquilizer gun produced a crack about as loud as a firecracker, which was mostly lost in the wind. The deer flinched, picked his head up, and looked around at the trees. The animal growled fiercely at the darkness, and darted out of range. Samuel lowered the gun, perplexed.

He slung his weapon across his back, carefully climbed to the ground, and set off toward where the buck had been. He quickly found his neon-fletched tranq dart lying in the mud, and squatted down to examine it more closely. As far as he could tell, the plunger hadn’t been depressed. The capsule was still full of fast-acting sedative, but the delivery needle had shattered on impact.

Frustrated, Samuel unclipped his radio from his belt.“Tower five to base, come in… over.”

After a moment, the radio crackled. “I hear you. Report… over”

“Looks like a deer made it onshore. Looks like I got a bum dart, broke on impact. Just my luck… over.”

“Uh, 10-4 tower five. You catch where it was headed? – Over.”

Samuel paused to study the hoof prints stamped in the mud.

“Yeah, looks like it ran off toward tower seven… over.”

“10-4. Be advised, tower seven, there may be a deer approaching you from the south-east. A tracking team is 10-17. Tower five head back to base. It is imperative you leave the area immediately… over ‘n out.”

“10-4, over ‘n out,” acknowledged a third voice, presumably another guard.

Samuel signed off too. He stowed his radio, pocketed his flashlight, and put his night vision goggles back on before starting back toward the Coast Guard station.

August 2011
Coast Guard Station — Plum Island

The old outpost was a rather unassuming building. It was comprised of two boxy floors stacked neatly atop one another, followed by a sharply-gabbled third floor, and capped with an octagonal watchtower. Warm light glowed in the windows along the first floor, but the second level was completely dark. Samuel knew the inside of this floor was completely sealed off – every aperture boarded up and enclosed with weather-stripping and caulk.

The first floor housed the incinerator, and the decontamination showers that acted as an airlock to the hermetically sealed living space. An oxygen scrubber insured those upper floors were as isolated as the international space station.

On that particular evening, it seemed the ordinary precautions were not enough.

A HAZMAT team stood waiting to spray him with chemical foam, and prod him with long-bristled scrubbing brushes. After a preliminary wash — over his hollered protestations — the squadron dragged him inside and stuffed him into the decontamination shower. Here, he was ordered to strip naked, and place all clothing and equipment in a thick red plastic tub, which a pair of guards promptly sealed before scrubbing him down until his skin turned pink.

Next, he was offered clean clothes from a green tote container, and ordered to proceed upstairs. Once dressed, the interior airlock slid open with a mechanical hiss, and shut just soon after Samuel passed through.

Outside of the chemical shower, the laboratory feel of the building quickly faded back to the original décor of the aging Coast Guard outpost. The hallway leading to the staircase could have been plucked from a 1930’s home, and most of the upstairs quarters maintained the same feel.

Outpost commander Jeffry Pike stood waiting for him at the top of the stairs.

“Glad to see you’re alright, Mr. Piper,” Jeffry said.

“Thank you,” Samuel replied. He stepped gingerly up the stairs to prevent his irritated skin from rubbing against the rough cotton of his replacement clothes. “I’d have thought you might have mentioned the shower over the radio.”

“Too risky to have this kind of information over the airwaves. All the patrolmen have been ordered to hunker down. The governor has already called in the National Guard to set up a perimeter around the island in case there are any more,” Jeffry explained.

“Anymore what?”

“Deer.”

“Sir, I think we’re more than equipped to handle an animal,” Samuel scoffed.

Jeffry shakes his head. “You weren’t the first to see it Mr. Piper; watchmen at posts three and four both tried to take it down as well. Both reported broken darts. Thank God you had the sense not to chase the damn thing.”

“Collins and Sanders? They tried to chase it down?” Samuel asked. “What did they find?”

“Sanders is dead,” Jeffry says gravely. “And I’m not sure Collins will pull through. It looks like both picked up what the deer was carrying.”

“Christ,” Samuel whispered. “Is it that contagious?”

“We’re not sure. But we’re confident you haven’t contracted it. Sanders was symptomatic when discovered, and Collins started showing signs a few minutes after touching him.”

“And I suppose the boys in the lab have nothing to say about this?”

“Actually, they were surprisingly forthcoming,” Jeffry admitted. “When Collins found Sanders in the field, I called it in.”

“What did they say?”

“Burn the body, no hesitation,” Jeffry said coldly. “They said they were working to nail down a vaccine for an extremely unstable strain of some livestock disease. He called it OV-something. Gives animals lesions, and makes ‘em bleed from their eyes and ears. Apparently it’s even more aggressive in deer than cattle,” Jeffry explained.

Samuel bit his lip and looked at the floor. “I don’t get it. How the hell did this thing get outside?”

“Mistakes happen,” Jeffry said.

“No, not like this they don’t,” Samuel shook his head. “Something is off.”

“Think what you like, but we have new orders now.”

“Which are?”

“Quarantine. We have to wait this out until the National Guard can get in place and sweep for any infected animals,” He said. Then, he ominously added: “And people.”

Next episode coming soon…

Thank You for Reading!

This post is part of the Plum Island Novella, following journalist Calvin Noble’s attempts to uncover a lab leak at a controversial research facility.

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