They meet up in the parking lot fifteen minutes later. Diego is standing slightly apart from the rest of the group, head tilted as if listening to something. As she nears him, Wendy sees a gentle breeze ruffling through the longer dark strands of hair atop the shaved sides of his head, though the rest of the air in the vicinity is calm. She sends Libby a questioning gaze but receives a shrug and a shake of the head in reply. Maddie has a brown satchel slung diagonally across her torso, her peach hair pulled back in a loose braid. Libby’s shoulder length blond hair is pulled back into a low ponytail and Sepulveda’s raven black hair is worn in her usual bun. A blue-and-gold head wrap covers Wendy’s ear-length natural hair, if the wind picks up her hair won’t be disturbed.
Though Wendy continues to feel eyes watching them as they return to streamside, nothing attacks them. They walk into the clearing where Ranger Brunner and Sepulveda join the sheriff and Sully at staking out corners of the clearing. Wendy and the other Psycepts take advantage of the protection to form a loose circle in the center of the clearing to better able to communicate with each other. The police people step closer to overhear the conversation while keeping an eye out.
“Okay, I’ll go first. I don’t have much to report but I’ve felt something watching us since we first got here. It even followed Brunner and me to the parking lot to meet Libby and the rest. It’s not threatening, but I want to bring the watcher out into the open after we speak. Enough with the hiding.”
“I, too, have felt the watching gaze. The birds tell me that nothing is amiss here any longer. The creature who dwelled here moved to another part of the forest a few weeks ago, farther along the Quesahanough Run, almost at the West Branch. The birds could not tell me much about the creature, they have avoided the area for the most part, only occasionally flying overhead to check on things.
“I also asked the birds about circling the body on Sunday. They said the they were asked to, but they will not say by whom. Just that it is a good thing, not bad. They also do not know how the person died,” Tewow concludes.
“Well, I finished analyzing the blood from the hospital and I think I have an idea,” Libby begins speaking. “When the children first presented, blood samples were drawn but the focus was on white blood cells as the belief was the children were infected. Indeed, the WBC differential levels were high, which would usually indicate the immune system was fighting off something. However, when I looked at the blood samples this afternoon, I noticed something.
“There were samples taken after Wendy treated the children and left. I compared those to the samples taken during the active infection, and I don’t think a bacteria or other infectious agent was the cause. Instead, I think something corrupted the red blood cells. I did several blood smears and noticed that though several RBCs were the normal size and shape, there was the slightest difference in color at the center. As I broke open the RBCs to look inside, I noticed the hemoglobin was not the usual red but a yellowish-pink. Hemoglobin is a protein inside RBCs that binds to oxygen and the heme part of hemoglobin has an iron core, which gives it the red pigmentation. In addition to the slight discoloration, I noticed less oxygen binding. There were only three spots for oxygen, when there is usually four. Given the small number of RBCs that were affected by the discoloration and that normal lab values were reported on the children’s charts by the hospital, this wasn’t enough to produce symptoms of anemia.
“I have a theory that may be confirmed with obtaining samples from the deceased man. I think there was something venomous introduced into the bloodstream which invaded RBCs. The body detected the slight change in some RBCs and stimulated production of new RBCs, which means more blood traveling to the bone marrow to supply nutrients. However, there wasn’t a corresponding increase in the number of RBCs.
I hypothesize that if we were to look at the bone marrow, we would notice something wrong. Maybe megaloblastic RBCs were produced which the body destroyed before they could reach the blood circulation. Or the corruption altered the bone marrow stimulus to increase WBC production instead. Increased WBCs, which the children had, are usually signs of infection. The notes indicate that the children’s spleens were enlarged, which can be a sign of infection or a sign that the spleen is cleaning up the blood in its capacity as the body’s blood filter. Also, the children had small clusters of petechiae scattered on their face, torsos, and lower limbs which were attributed to either the unknown infectious agent or a skin reaction to the different antibiotics.
“In any case, I would be interested to know if any of this was found in the man’s body from yesterday. However, for it to affect an adult man versus a smaller child’s size is interesting. Perhaps the dose of venom was massive in the man but much smaller in the children? Or maybe the man had an underlying health condition which affected his reaction to the venom, like he was asplenic or had a hematological disorder. That’s it for my new contributions
