The Byssus Killer by Charles Tucker (read a book .TXT) 📗

unusable. They did not know it, but they were being afflicted by an invasion of the byssus-chitin platelets as they transformed into diamond hard coatings on their skin.

The euphoria of finding a new home-grown source of income to challenge the deep-sea tuna industry dried up. Nearly everyone on the fish quays of Concarneau and Douarnenez was physically unfit to work. Families who had feasted on the Pinna nobilis bouillabaisse were suffering internal pains. Their blood systems, cells and organs had been invaded by billions of nano-sized byssus chitin platelets, cutting into cell walls. Doctors were baffled by so many cases of internal bleeding.

The Brittany challenge to the French Carte Vitale health system was considerable.

The Concarneau trawlermen were pilloried for bringing disaster upon the fishing fraternity.

An air of foreboding hung heavily over the grey-dark sea. The lightning forked down. The thunder crashed. Nature in concert with lunar forces produced the lowest spring tide for a decade. Rocks not seen for a generation lay bare. The heavy inrushing swell roared across the reefs ripping up age-old seaweed. The two mutated Pinna nobilis shells crashed and smashed amongst the rocky reefs. The gulls were soaring on the gale waiting to swoop on the open shells and devour the mutated innards. The Douarnenez trawlermen watched in despair as the two protected breeding Nobilis shells met their demise. Fears of retribution pierced their chests.

The Soul of the Sea was displeased.

On the Cornish side of the Channel, the seabed around St Michael’s Mount was rudely exposed, tree stumps and ruined buildings appearing tor the first time in living memory. The Seven Stones reef stood proudly above the Atlantic. Old residents in Sennen Cove drew upon the legends of Lyonnesse. They swore they heard the bells ringing out from the one hundred and forty churches buried under the great wall of water that created the ‘Lost Land of Lyonnesse’.

“There’s evil around when those bells ring out ‘The Warning’. Nothing good can come of crackpot scientists messing about with the Seven Stones. That castle that stood on them once was proper holy. Then the men of Lyonnesse went all Sodom and Gomarrah. They were destroyed in the Great Inundation. Retribution it was.”

Fears of the return of the Great Inundation pierced their chests.

On the Cornish side of the Channel, the Soul of the Sea was displeased.

 

 

 The Biologist’s Nemesis

A finer approach was adopted, aligning the physical and chemical elements of the byssus platelets and how they formed threads despite the action of digestive juices, enzymes and bacteria in the starfish stomachs. The electron microscope was dusted off. The stand-out difference between the byssus threads and the starfish stomach contents was the protein element in the byssus thread, chitin. Chitin is an elastic protein giving the byssus thread its flexibility to be woven. In the shell mutation, the chitin allowed byssus threads to join into plates and wrap around victims like clingfilm. The scientists could not understand how the chitin elasticity disappeared when the wrapping was complete. Diamond hardness set in immediately.

The solution to destroying the diamond hard coating appeared to lie with the chitin: restore its elasticity and stretch it off, or mimic the starfish and attack the coating in its hard state. Starfish cracked open any chitin-based shells. A detailed analysis of the starfish stomach enzymes and bacteria revealed two enzymes, lysozyme and chitinase, which caused mollusc shells to weaken, thin and become biodegradable.

Biologist Jones knew his previous blitzkrieg attack using mashed up starfish bodies had split open the diamond hard coating on the Irish Setter. Having isolated the active shell splitting enzymes, lysozyme and chitinase, he had the weapons to do a single massive release on one hundred and five encased victims.

He could not do it. He did not want the responsibility of bringing back to life suspended animation victims who had been under the sea for decades. He did not want to hand over the enzymes to the scientists who, he believed, did not share his altruistic scruples. They would not be troubled if released zombies escaped. He knew, in his heart, the zombies would have the killer byssus strain in their DNA. They were capable of a collective consciousness mass killing.

Stone Man frightened him. The encased, unblinking staring blue eyes unnerved him. Stone Man’s shaking of his casing against the morgue walls panicked him. He could never release Stone Man unless his brain had recovered.

The one hundred encased crew off the factory ship had already shown mass consciousness in tune with the release of the Irish Setter. They had invoked the wrath of the mutated transparent byssus shells when they started filleting them on the processing floor. The vengeance they would wreak upon release would be unimaginable. He could not condone their release.

It was the four crew members of the ill-fated Sardinian trot boat that fascinated him. They had clearly drowned in the catastrophic storm on the Seven Stones. The normal metre long Pinna nobilis shells attached to the trot boat had pulled the four crew into their tight bunch and covered them in ‘saliva’. Saliva was Senora Vigo’s description of the emission of gum, threads and beards to attach the shells to rocks.

Jones’ altruistic faith would have taken the flight of angels had he been with the four crew on their slow descent to the rocky seabed. They heard the chords of siren voices. They saw the vision of Saint Bisso of Sant Antioco, an image of Senora Vigo, in an azure blue celestial haze. They felt the warmth of the saliva blanket. They relaxed, closed their eyes and let time cease to exist. They were in the arms of ‘the Soul of the Sea’.

 

 

 The Release

The scientists, biologists and technicians met to thrash out the release programme for one hundred and five encased victims.

The scientists and technicians led by Doctors Mason and James had a strong desire to crack