Date: 4/16/2003
Subject: Lightning over the desert

The heat of the midday was suffocating, and I languished under my mosquito netting, trying to read a medical journal whose edges had browned and curled from the wear and tear of the road. The tent around me swam with the mirage of evaporating moisture, steaming into the air. A death stalker scorpion stealthily crawled from a hiding place under the foot of my field desk to scurry warily towards the darkness of my discarded boot. I made a mental note to myself to be sure and kill him later.

The scorpions could be deadly, and bore names which evoked a singular glory for such a small creature. To my sheer amazement, the military did not prepare for any contact with the wildlife on their move forward, and as such the closest location for any of the anti-venom for the three possible flavors of neurotoxic scorpion bites, the singular cytotoxic one, or the dozens of viper and cobra species which inhabit the area was in Saudi Arabia, or worse yet, in France.

As for the rabies im munoglobulin post-exposure prophylaxis, there was none to be found in the U.S. military hospital system in Iraq. This became acutely apparent to me when my somnolesence was broken by a soldier rushing in through the flap of the tent. As his eyes adjusted to the darkness, he called for the vet. “You’re wanted in EMT, there’s been a bite.” Just a matter of time. There are thousands of feral dogs in our area alone, and all are getting hungrier and more and more brazen. The soldiers, marines and airmen are sure to try and interact, as there is nothing so comforting as a friendly dog. But in this case, with rabies endemic in the region, that interaction could be as fatal as French kissing a Desert Horned Viper.

The other problem with the dogs is our trash. We generate an incomprehensible amount of garbage, most of which gets burned, creating huge, billowing tarry black clouds which mar the perfect blue. The dogs have been getting into that trash, and swallowing bits and pieces of the MRE packets whole. I discovered this following several necropsies of euthanized dogs. All of them had abnormal kidneys, which followed the constant state of dehydration, but they also had a belly-full of peanut butter and cheese packages. These wrappings are a special plastic/metal combination designed to keep the food shelf stable for years, but in the stomach of a half-starved dog, it would turn out to be deadly. Those sharp metal edges would tear through the stomach and intestinal lining, irritating, and eventually perforating the gut. The ulcerated or lacerated bowel would start to leak the bacteria rich fecal matter into the abdomen, setting up the massive bacteria growth, commonly known as peritonitis. Likely, the dogs would suffer and die in a quiet location that they would crawl to. Hiding in their final moments of weakness and excruciating pain. I would be unable to find them to slip a needle into their vein and with soothing words calm their final instants as the Phenobarbital eased away the pain and sent them into a final and terminal sleep on a soft bed of a massive overdose of anesthetic.

I grabbed my boot, death stalker and all and walked out into the day. Shaking the interloper out, he fell to the ground, claws gaping, and tail poised to strike. In a half hop, I got my boot on, and hurried to the Emergency Medical Treatment ward. A marine had in fact been bitten, but not on his hand, where I had cynically and silently anticipated the bite would be. Instead, it was on his leg. The EMT doc swirled to face me. Glowering, the young doctor, showed his impatience and frustration.

“One of those mangy mutts bit him. What are YOU doing about it?”

Funny, I thought to myself. I went to an Ivy League for twelve years, garnering three degrees, to come to war as a licensed veterinarian where my medical colleagues think of me only as a glorified dog catcher. I ignored the arrogant Captain, putting off his manner to his own impotence in the current dilemma. Instead, I spoke directly to the Marine, questioning him as to the location, timing, and events leading to the bite.

Most likely, the dog had been seduced forward with food, or had been the subject of a kick, when she turned and bit. Regardless, her life was forfeit, and we needed to be sure that rabies was not an issue. The theatre did not have the necessary treatment which ideally would be initiated immediately, instead, the marine would have to be flown to Germany to be cared for, and I had to get the dog’s head.

I dispatched the marines back to Nasariyah to their stronghold on the Euphrates to try and trap the death row victim. Asking specifically that they use an M16 to dispatch her with a well aimed round to the heart. Not the head, I needed it intact. Several hours later, the sun began to set, filling the sky with a pallet of deep oranges and reds, silhouetting the medical helicopters in a fluid wash of color. Behind the beauty, grey clouds were rolling in. The marines returned with their prey, like big game hunters having bagged their first lion.

I loaded the corpse into the back of a hummvee and grabbed my tech, Masteller, to perform a quick and field expedient necropsy. We found an abandoned parking lot and using the vehicle lights to see, I began to cut through the bags holding her.
As I examined the dog, the storm hit.

Lighting strikes and thunder rolls initiated their own shock and awe campaign against me as I crouched over my quarry. The knives glittered in each flash as I called out the external injuries and wounds for Masteller to transcribe. As the rain began to fall in huge swollen drops, I noted to my dismay, the round, blue edged hole leading into the temporal bone of the skull. They had shot her through the head, executing her in their fear for their comrade.

In an instant, Masteller and I were soaked through, and the lightning continued to lash about us like a whip. I severed the head carefully, using face masks and double gloves to protect us from any possible splash of rabies virus laden fluid.

The violence of the storm, the seriousness of the mission, and the mere fact of the gore seeping along the pavement with the rainwater, could only make me laugh as Masteller answered a question with “Yes, Dr. Frankenstein.”

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