Page 37 - Unlikely Stories 4

The Vaccinators

further intrusions by the whites. Evidently they had not been
impressed by their civilized brethren accompanying Dr. Plompkin,
and needed to protect themselves against a different sort of infection.
Consequently, they seized and murdered our colleague upon his
arrival, sending his team fleeing in all directions. I’m certain they will
not return to us, probably fearing punishment for not preventing his
death.
But that was not the end of it. Dr. Plompkin’s remains were
cooked for several days into a soup of bones and tissue, creating an
analogue to our dead virus antigen. Then the elder, using the syringes
and needles in the doctor’s medical kit, injected quantities of that
noxious brew into every member of the tribe, intending to have one
of them inject him last. But he never got his share of the so-called
vaccine against white people and their pollution: his people sickened
and died rapidly. He had buried them all, consumed the last of the
stored food, and secluded himself to die alone, the last of his people.
As incredible as it sounds, we did find the recent graves, the large
cooking pot and the dirty needle this amateur physician had wielded
to effectively undo any benefit our inoculations might have provided.
He was near death when we arrived, and did not last the day. My last
question to him, asked in I cannot now recall what state of horror
and exasperation, was why he thought his vaccine failed. Convinced
to the end of the efficacy of sympathetic magic, he replied: “It wasn’t
boiled enough.”

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