Hyperallergenic Dog
Reece’s arrival to the dog park put everyone else on edge. The gate chimed when he passed through with his pet, alerting the other dogs and their owners. Glitch was the result of perverse bioengineering. It looked like a terrier by its wiry frame, but what made it stand apart was how its body shed a cloud of microscopic particles with every step.
Every single flake was a purpose-built protein that could bind to mammalian respiratory systems and cause a significant reactions with breathtaking efficiency.
A man tossing a Frisbee for his golden retriever noticed this first. His nose wrinkled and then he let out a loud sneeze. The golden retriever let out a string of wheezing snorts but couldn’t seem to get the flakes out of its system. A young mother started rubbing her eyes as they began to sting while her pug let out a whine of pain.
Reece smugly watched everyone around him cough and sneeze, suddenly assaulted by allergies. He didn’t view this as a problem, but a way to inject a bit of excitement into the otherwise dull dog park. The world was too clean and predictable. It was necessary sometimes to shake things up.
“For God’s sake, Reece, stop doing this!” one of his neighbors, Sarah, chastised him as she retrieved her beagle. “Other people, and dogs, use this park as well!”
“It’s a public park, Sarah,” he said with a sarcastic shrug. “Glitch is a dog and he has as much right to be here as anyone else. Besides, I’m not doing anything illegal. Perhaps you should visit the pharmacy instead of complaining.”
Reece reached down and unclipped the leash around Glitch’s neck. “Go play,” he said and the dog ran off further into the park, leaving a trail of particles in his wake. The other owners thought it was best to collect their dogs and leave the park. Reece took a seat on a bench and watched his dog run around excitedly, having the entire space to himself. He felt a lot of satisfaction at his tiny victory.
However, on the other side of the park’s fence was the community greenhouse. Kate was watching Reece and his hyper-allergenic dog running around by themselves. She stood in the middle of her marigold plantings, a specific variety that could draw heavy metals out of the soil. The petals had a dark orange tint like copper.
Kate recognized Reece as a vulnerability in their shared network. He was a known troublemaker and had a history of anti-social behavior. She had been keeping an eye on him for a while, but finally came up with a plan to reinforce social norms. She wiped her hand on her trousers and pulled out her phone. She decided to send a message, not to him but to the neighborhood’s secure messaging network.
Subject: Fix the Dog Park Bug
They met the next day at the community greenhouse, a space that had a vibrant floral smell and often served as a community gathering spot. Kate had set up a small table and chairs in the middle and projected a map of the dog park onto the wall.
“The only way we can deal with this is through the Association,” argued Mr. Joyce, a retiree who had lived in the neighborhood for decades. “I’m sure we can find something: a noise ordinance, a public nuisance law...”
“He’s not noisy,” Sarah said with a hoarse throat. “He’s not really a nuisance either. He’s just very allergenic. There’s no ordinance against that.”
“If there isn’t one, there should be,” Mr. Joyce huffed.
“Reece wants us to pursue legal action. It’s all a setup for his stunt. If we go to the Association, he’ll say that the park is public and his dog is licensed and there was no threat of violence. Then we become the bad guys,” Kate cut in on their conversation.
They knew this was all a troll, and that Reece would use their own actions to further his own entertainment. It was an uncomfortable truth.
“We have to do something. He’s monopolizing the park and making it unusable for everyone else,” Sarah grumbled.
“We can do something without restricting his freedom. Instead, we reinforce my own.”
She gestured to the park map on the wall and then swiped her finger a few inches across it. The map was replaced with a model of a molecule rotating in space.
“Reece’s dog uses a specific protein that unlocks the histamine reaction in mammals. Basically, he designed the dog to cause allergies.”
“That’s a cruel thing to do, but what are we supposed to do a bout it?” Mr. Joyce asked.
“We use better biology,” Kate replied, her eyes bright with determination. “We need a countermeasure which can bind to the protein and render it inert before we breathe it in.”
“Is that even possible?” Sarah asked, her voice tinged with skepticism.
“Technically it is,” Kate smiled. “In this greenhouse I’ve got a modified variant of a desert moss. I can tweak its genome to produce a unique enzyme that will literally feed on the dog’s allergenic protein. It will produce a harmless byproduct that is like a natural fertilizer.”
Sarah and Mr. Joyce were both baffled by this. They had no idea that such a thing was even possible, let alone achievable.
A young, lanky teen leaned forward. Theo hadn’t said much, since he was not interested in interpersonal conflicts, but the idea of using bioengineering to solve a problem intrigued him.
“How would you deploy it? You can’t just plant the moss everywhere without being seen. You’d need some sort of passive delivery system.”
“I’ve thought about that too,” Kate swiped her hand across the wall again. This next image was of a small drone the size of an insect. “I have an atmospheric survey drone that I can modify to disperse tiny spores, like a fogger. You can help me with that if you want. If we do it in the middle of the night, we can seed the entire park without anyone knowing.”
“So we fight his trolling with some gardening?” Sarah asked, not sure how to feel about the plan.
“Exactly,” Kate confirmed as she looked around the table. Sarah seemed convinced, although Mr. Joyce was still grumbling under his breath. It may not have been his preferred solution, but if this didn’t work they could pursue legal pathways instead.
The greenhouse was soon thick with the smell of hot solder. Three small drones rested on a workbench next to Theo, each shaped like a dragonfly with 3D-printed bodies. He had cables connected to the back of each one to perform diagnostic checks. Each of their navigational lights blinked in sequence, confirming that they were ready.
“I have the spores here,” Kate came by with a thermos that, despite being sealed tightly, still had a faint glow at the seams. “There are trillions of microscopic moss spores in here. They’ll be ready to photosynthesize as soon as the sun rises.”
Theo took a step back and let Kate perform the careful task of transferring the spores. She had the focus of a surgeon as she poured a small amount into the custom-built reservoirs on the bottom of each drone.
“I can see the diagnostics for the drones,” Theo monitored his screen. “Pressure looks good. Nozzles are clear. We’re good to go.”
“Joyce, are you in position?” Kate spoke into her phone, connected to the neighborhood’s secure messaging network.
“This is Joyce. I’m up in the attic window and can see the whole block from here. It’s all quiet.”
Theo ran over to the greenhouse door and pushed it open just a small crack. One-by-one, the drones began to rise into the air and into the open sky. They were silent as they ascended thanks to their electric motors. Their flight path had been pre-programmed to take them to the dog park nearby.
Kate and Theo looked at the screen which now displayed a live view from the drones’ cameras. They had reached the park. Using a triangular formation, the drones swept through the park dispensing the spray from their nozzles. The mist was so fine that it was invisible on the cameras. After seven minutes, the drones had completed their mission and flew back to the greenhouse.
They went to bed late and woke up early. The next morning, Kate put a double espresso in her thermos as she went for her usual walk through the part. The sun was bright in the sky, reflecting off the dew on the grass. Nothing seemed to be out of the ordinary. But when she knelt by one of the benches, she saw a small patch of moss no larger than her pinkie. Now she had to wait for Reece to show.
Other neighbors started to arrive at the park with their dogs. Sarah’s beagle ran around with a tennis ball in its mouth while Mr. Joyce brought an old paperback to read on a bench. Everything looked normal, an ordinary day. But Kate kept her eyes on the park’s entrance, waiting for Reece to show up with his dog.
As expected, he arrived around noon. Glitch was trotting alongside him. Reece had a smug look on his face, expecting to unleash another round of allergy attacks. When he reached the gate of the dog park, he unclipped the dog’s leash and let it run along the perimeter in a frantic loop.
The dog shed a cloud of dander just as before, but this time nothing happened. There was no allergic reaction. The beagle didn’t even notice the new dog. Mr. Joyce was so engrossed in his book he hadn’t even seen Reece walk right past him. The allergen had been neutralized.
This wasn’t good news to Reece, who now looked confused and frustrated. The dog was now busy interacting with the beagle, the two becoming friendly. His eyes analytically scanned the park, looking for something different. Then he reached down and touched a faint layer of moss on the ground.
He looked up and locked eyes with Kate, who was watching from across the fence.
“You did something, what was it?” he demanded, his loud voice drawing the attention of the others.
“It’s a public space,” she gestured to the wider area around them. “This means the space should be accessible for everyone.”
He grimaced but couldn’t say anything in response. He had lost this round, outmatched by this biological counter. Now he was just a guy with a weird dog. The dog didn’t seem to care about the conflict, now happily playing with the others in contrast to his own attempts at superiority.
He let out a sharp whistle, calling Glitch back to him. He clipped the leash back on and left the dog park, his face red with humiliation. The others watched him leave and looked at each other with satisfied smiles.