The Hot Zone: Part 3, Chapter 5 Summary & Analysis

Meanwhile, an Army scientist named Thomas Ksiazek has been working in a Level 4 lab in a spacesuit to develop a rapid test for the Ebola virus. At last, on December 6th, he is successful. He tests urine and blood samples from Milton Frantig and finds that he does not appear to have Ebola. The mystery deepens—why hasn’t Frantig been infected?

It is the second day of the Army operation in the Reston monkey house and things are going smoothly. Jerry Jaax and Sergeant Amen go in to feed the monkeys, and they find many more dead or dying. They set up chairs in a semicircle for soldiers to take rest breaks while filling up syringes. Just as Jerry is about to take a break from working in Room C, he hears a commotion—Sergeants Amen and Klages inform him that a monkey has escaped. This is Jerry’s worst nightmare: a strong, fast, angry, and possibly Ebola-infected monkey ready to fight off and bite vulnerable soldiers.

The men find a net and begin to track down the escaped monkey. Rhonda Williams remembers it running under her feet and out of the room before scampering back in, while Jerry insists that it always remained within Room C. Jerry turns out to be right, but other monkeys bite the escapee, and soon it is tracking blood throughout the room. Jerry gets on the radio with Gene Johnson, who tells him to “do whatever had to be done.” They contemplate shooting the monkey, but quickly scrap this idea, because of the danger of ricochets. At last, proceeding slowly and calmly, Jerry begins to track the animal, with the help of Sergeant Amen. The monkey is too fast, however, and Jerry begins to feel out of control.

Outside the building, C. J. Peters has come by to observe—he is out of uniform. Suddenly he sees a stranger near the front of the building—it is a reporter from the Washington Post. Peters assures him that nothing much is happening, and the reporter leaves.

Back inside the monkey house, Jerry decides to leave the escaped monkey in the room overnight. Meanwhile the surviving monkeys have become upset. Jerry decides to give the lower-ranking soldiers more responsibility, and Rhonda Williams ends up on euthanasia duty with Major Nate Powell. It is her job to plunge a needle into the monkey’s heart, instantly killing it. When she pulls the needle out, blood spurts out as well. She makes sure to rinse off her gloves and her spacesuit often. Occasionally Rhonda misses the heart, causing the animal’s body to jerk in a “death reflex.”

Next Rhonda Williams works with Captain Haines at the bleed table, drawing blood from unconscious monkeys. As she does so, one of the monkeys wakes up—it goes to pull the needle out of its leg before trying to bite Rhonda. Captain Haines pins the monkey down as Rhonda tries to stop the monkey’s blood from pouring out. At last a soldier injects the monkey with ketamine and it goes limp.

Peter Jahrling, meanwhile, has been spending all his time in his spacesuit running tests on monkey samples, while Tom Geisbert has been working equally hard at his electron microscope. Occasionally the two check in with each other, but neither seems to be getting ill. Further, as discoverers of the strain, they are going to get the chance to name it. Jahrling has also been testing his and Geisbert’s blood, although he still believes that they most likely were not infected. He is disturbed, however, by the thought that Milton Frantig may have contracted Ebola.

Jahrling carries slides of his own blood serum into his lab and looks at them under a microscope—if it glows bright green, then he is infected. Exhausted and worried, he begins to doubt his own judgment, but at last, realizing that there is no glow, he is relieved. The same goes for Geisbert’s blood. At 11 PM Jahrling enters the decontamination shower, intending to go home, but instead he falls asleep in there, and is only woken up by a harsh blast of water.

Rhonda Williams is standing in a deserted corridor of the monkey house. Suddenly the escaped monkey comes towards her, holding a syringe filled with a hot virus. She tries to escape him but her spacesuit slows her down. At last she wakes up, realizing that she’s been having a nightmare.