Agent Omega: You Only Live Forever

by Schaffer, Bernard

  Donovan nodded as Pryce spoke. When he was done listening, he crossed his legs and tightened his robe, carefully regarding each man before he said, "I think it is a brilliant plan. I cannot believe the two of you pulled this off. It will go down as one of the single greatest achievements in the history of physics. But there is one small flaw."

  "What flaw?" Einstein scoffed.

  "It's too late to kill Hitler by the time he gets to Lansberg. You'll only make him a martyr. A better idea is to kill him while he is a child."

  "What?" Pryce said.

  "Colonel, this is not the time to make jokes. We are here on serious business," Einstein said.

  Donovan downed the rest of his drink and said, "I'm not joking." He got up from his chair and opened the closet door at the far end of the office, then bent down to remove a small luggage trunk. "I held onto a few things from OSS. Didn't know who to give them to, to be honest. I'm sure that cross-dressing freak Hoover would love to get his hands on this stuff, but since he didn't ask, I'm not volunteering."

  Donovan opened the chest and pulled out a file stamped TOP SECRET across the front. He carried it over to the table in front of the other men and opened it, spreading multiple papers, photographs and maps across the surface. Pryce picked up the photograph nearest to him, a large black and white image of Hitler surrounded by swastikas, smashing his fist against a podium in outrage.

  Donovan pointed to an older, yellowed family portrait that showed a different stern-faced man sitting next to his wife, with two young boys and an infant female between them. "This was taken in Leonding when Hitler was seven years old. He's the boy on the right. Just before little Adolph was born, three of his older siblings had already died. The little boy next to him was named Edmund. He died four years later of the measles. It's said that after that death, Adolph's personality changed."

  "Is that Hitler's father?" Pryce said in fascination.

  Donovan nodded, "That is Alois Hitler, Sr. I'm told he was fond of the old drink. Apparently he used his wife as a punching bag on regular occasions."

  Einstein picked up the photograph and stared at it, "It must have been very difficult to grow up in such an environment."

  Pryce looked sideways at the Professor, "Yeah, it's a terrible thing that happens to a lot of people, professor. They don't go around committing genocide as a result of it."

  "Our humanity is what separates us from men like Hitler, Omega. We must struggle to retain hold of it as much as we can."

  "This was your idea, professor," Pryce reminded him. "You were the one who wanted to go back in time and kill the bastard."

  Donovan tapped the family portrait in Einstein's hands and said, "What you're looking at is a family used to dealing with loss. In that era, with the history of death and illness running so strongly in the Hitler children, it won't raise an eyebrow if the kid doesn't wake up one morning."

  "What do you have in mind?" Pryce said.

  "Keep it simple. Pillow over the face while he's asleep. No need to make him suffer at that age. If he were a little older, I'd say sure, but as a child? Just punch his clock and get the hell out of there," Donovan said.

  "Agreed," Pryce said.

  "This is outrageous!" Einstein shouted. The old man jumped to his feet and said, "We are talking about the murder of a little boy and you discuss it as easily as if you were ordering dinner. All I wanted to do was spare the lives of innocents. The reason, the only reason, I came to you was because I heard you were a man of decency and honor, and instead, I see that I have gotten in league with worse monsters than the ones who dropped the A-Bomb!"

  "This will spare the lives of innocents, professor," Donovan said. "Now sit down and let's be reasonable."

  "No. I will not listen to any more of this immoral nonsense and I will not be part of it," Einstein said. "I come to you to prevent one crime against humanity and you answer me with something equally horrific. I will not allow you to do this."

  "And exactly how do you plan on doing that?" Donovan said. "Who are you going to tell about it to stop us, and really, what would you tell them?"

  Einstein's fists shook in frustration before he turned for the door. He looked back at them with such withering anger that Pryce felt like a small child being berated by an irate school master, "Every time a man of science speaks to men like you, it is the same. My soul is filthy because of what you people do with my ideas." Einstein opened the door and slammed it shut behind him, heading down the driveway in a rage.

  "Let him go, Sean," Donovan said. "He'll be fine. The world needs idealists and dreamers like him the same way it needs people like us."

  Pryce looked at Donovan and said, "And why the hell does the world need people like us, Colonel?"

  "Because we're the only thing that keeps the idealists and dreamers from being murdered."

  The year was 1899. He knew it because of the uneven cobblestone streets splattered with horse manure. He knew it from the rugged clothing and oversized newspapers printed on antique paper. He knew it because he grabbed one of the newspapers and covered his nakedness with it as he squatted in the bushes, and the date printed across the top said 1899 in large Germanic script.

  He was looking at a monastery set in the middle of the town and was shocked to see swastikas carved into the doorway and windows. He'd known the symbol had various meanings before the Nazis corrupted it, but it was still a shock to see it so boldly displayed. Pryce looked through the monastery's large windows and saw an office inside with priest's clothing hanging near the doorway.

  That would do just fine.

  He rematerialized inside the office and snatched the robe from its hook, sliding his head and arms through it just as a boy came barging through the door and stopped abruptly. The boy was looking down at Pryce's bare feet in wonder. Pryce wiggled his toes and said in imperfect Austrian, "Was it you? I bet it was. You have that look about you."

  "Was it me, what, sir?" the boy said.

  "Who stole my pants and shoes?" Pryce said. "You look like the type to do such a thing."

  The boy did not, in fact, look like the type. He was a small, thin creature with shaggy brown hair. The kind more likely to walk around with his nose stuck inside a book all day than steal anything, Pryce thought. He kept up his menacing gaze and said, "Well, if it wasn't you, I bet you know who did it."

  "No, father," the boy squeaked.

  "Very well," Pryce said finally, trying not to laugh at the look of terror on the boy's face. "Off you go, then. Run along."

  The boy turned to leave, but just as he turned, another priest was standing in his way.

  "What are you doing over here, Adolph? Father Linser is waiting for you at choir practice."

  "Yes, Father," the boy said. "I will go there now."

  The boy scurried out of the office and down the hall, huffing as his small feet pounded the marble floors. The priest looked at Pryce standing in his office in surprise, "Hello? Can I help you, Father…?"

  "Schett," Pryce replied. "I have been sent from Baden to observe your methods, as we are opening our own school and have heard only great things about the work you are doing."

  "Oh, in that case, you are welcome to stay and observe as much as you like…" the priest stopped speaking as he looked down at Pryce's bare feet.

  Pryce nodded at them and said, "I always come in the most humble fashion into a new house of the Lord. It is my custom. Tell me, who was that lad I was just speaking with?"

  The priest looked back down the hall and frowned, thinking it over. "Hitler, I believe? Quiet little runt. Why, was he giving you a hard time?"

  "No," Pryce said quietly. "Not at all."

  Pryce looked down from the monastery's attic windows at the village below. He was watching the main street that ran through the center of several shops and stores, where thick women strolled along and hard-looking men with long, billowing mustaches stood in the sunlight and smoked. Some of them watched the women pass and called out to them, smiling broadly whe
n it actually drew their attention.

  A dapper man exited one of the stores wearing a new-looking coat that he stopped and showed off to the first person he saw. Pryce could see shoes and shirts through the store's windows. Within seconds he vanished, dropping through the floor like a wraith, falling until he reached the basement. Pryce checked the street above him from one of the basement windows and saw that the path was clear. Luckily, no one noticed the brief appearance of a naked man running across the cobblestones before he vanished again.

  Pryce appeared in the rear of the store, staying low so the clerk could not see him. He grabbed a shirt and pants from a bin on the floor and snatched a pair of worn boots from the shelf, sliding everything on before the merchant raised his head and saw him standing there, fully dressed. "Good afternoon, sir. I am sorry. I must have missed you coming in."

  "I came in when you were selling that young man the fine looking coat."

  "I have more for sale if you would like to see them?" the merchant said eagerly. "I see that you've shopped here before from what you're wearing."

  Pryce patted the pockets of the pants he was wearing and frowned that they were empty. "Alas, I was just looking this time. Perhaps I will come back soon though, for the coat."

  The church bells rang and children marched out of the monastery's front door in single file, keeping perfect formation under the watchful eye of a stern-looking priest holding a paddle. Pryce spied young Adolph in the line and began to move with them. The priest watched the boys walk out to the road and then went back inside the church. They were no longer his concern. As soon as the monastery door closed, the children broke out running, all of them laughing and pushing one another until they reached the street.

  The group of them stopped at the corner to wait for a horse-drawn carriage to pass. Some of them joined hands to cross. Adolph linked arms with the child nearest him and they started skipping across the road, scraping the stones with the wooden soles of their shoes.

  The children scattered in different directions as they reached the other side of the street, but Adolph walked directly into the main door of an ugly-looking, squalid apartment building. Moments later, the boy re-emerged, holding the hand of boy smaller than himself, who shouted, "This time, I want to be Old Shatterhand, Adolph!"

  Adolph hurried after him, calling out, "All right, Edmund. I will be the Indian Chief first and you can try to capture me."

  They ran into the woods around the side of the building, chasing one another through the trees. They hopped as they ran, making clopping sounds like they were on horseback. The one called Edmund fired an imaginary rifle at his older brother and Adolph clutched his chest dramatically and fell to the ground. "You got me, Old Shatterhand," Adolph announced. "I am finished!"

  Edmund giggled and danced around the fallen Indian Chief. "I killed you! I killed you!"

  "Yes, Edmund. It was an excellent shot."

  The boys played for over an hour, talking turns being the Cowboy and the Indian. As the sun began to descend, Adolph looked up the horizon and said, "It's time to go back in, Edmund. Mummy wants us to wash up before dinner."

  "I don't want to!"

  "Father is going to be home soon and we must be clean, or else he will be very angry with all of us."

  One of the windows above them on the second-floor opened and a thin, pleasant looking woman said, "Adolph? Edmund? Time to come up, boys."

  "See?" Adolph said. He cupped his hand to the side of his mouth and shouted up, "Coming, Mummy!"

  "No!" Edmund said, right before he took off running into the woods.

  Adolph called for the little boy to come back. He crossed his arms and tapped his foot patiently, saying, "Edmund. This is not the time for games. Let's go in."

  There was no response.

  "Edmund?" Adolph said. "Where are you?"

  Pryce appeared on the second floor of the building in the hallway outside of the Hitler's apartment. He pressed his ear to the door, listening to the sound of banging pots and pans in the kitchen. Mrs. Hitler did not look up from the sink as Pryce appeared behind her and silently crept down the hall toward the bedrooms. There were only two. Both were small, with single beds, and both were exceptionally clean.

  The boys' room had only a sparse amount of furniture. The single bookshelf in the room was crammed with children's books, including several volumes by James Fenimore Cooper and Karl May about America's Wild West. Pryce picked up a beaten-up looking copy of The Adventures of Old Shatterhand and thumbed through the pages while little Adolph continued to call for his brother outside.

  Pryce put the book back and picked up a pillow off the bed, testing its firmness with both hands. He imagined the two little boys sleeping in their bed as he silently came up beside them. It would be fast and painless, just as Donovan had suggested. Pryce would feel the young boy's hands grab for him in the darkness, but soon, they would go limp and fall away and it would be over.

  Until Edmund rolls over in the morning to see his dead brother lying beside him.

  Pryce heard Adolph outside, still yelling the name, "Edmund! Edmund! Where are you?"

  There was alarm in the boy's voice. Pryce looked down from the window to see Adolph racing across the woods toward Edmund, and when he finally caught him, he swept the boy up and hugged him tightly. Then he wagged his finger at the child and started dragging him toward the apartment building.

  Edmund seemed to be enjoying the game. Finally, he gave up and held his older brother's hand as they walked back inside together.

  What was it Einstein had said?

  "Our humanity is what separates us from men like Hitler, Omega. We must struggle to retain hold of it as much as we can."

  Pryce dropped the pillow back on the bed and vanished.

  J. Edgar Hoover snored like he was choking to death in his sleep. He muttered things too, having imaginary fights with people and barking commands. Sean Pryce walked around the FBI Director's bedroom, checking for weapons. He found a handgun on the nightstand near the bed that he quietly unloaded and tossed into a pile of dirty clothes in the hamper.

  Finally, he grew sick of the snoring and stood over Hoover and pressed his hand tight over the man's mouth.

  Hoover's eyes flew open and he convulsed in the bed in terror, trying to pry Pryce's hands away from his mouth. His hand swept the nightstand, scrambling to find his gun. Pryce simply waited until Hoover gave up and stopped struggling, realizing he had a better chance of lifting a Model-T in the air than Pryce's arm.

  "Where's Donovan?" Pryce said. "I went to his house but there were different people living there. Did you kill him?"

  Pryce let Hoover push his hand away and the man scowled, "Get your filthy hands off of me, you freak! Donovan left Washington five years ago. He's a civilian now. Where the hell have you been all this time?"

  Pryce stepped back and regarded Hoover in the dim moonlight. His skin was splotchy with liver spots. His hair was now brittle and thin. There were deep wrinkles in his face. "Five years ago?" Pryce whispered. "Something went wrong when I tried to come back. I don't know why I came so far ahead."

  The Director grimaced at him, "I don't believe a word you say, you traitorous son of a bitch. First you lied to us, then you abandoned us in our time of greatest need!"

  "Lied to you? About what?"

  "The artifact. We searched all of Gazala and there was nothing there but sand."

  "Did I say Gazala?" Pryce said with a smirk.

  "Get the hell out of my home," Hoover hissed. "You are done. You hear me? Done! You don't exist anymore. The United States Government no longer has need of your kind, so get out before I have you exterminated." Hoover opened his mouth to order the man to leave again and realized he was the only one in the room. He cursed and pulled the lamp string on his nightstand, fumbling around in the dark to try and find his glasses. He put them on and bent over the phone to dial a phone number that only three people in the country knew.

  The phone rang only once.r />
  "Good evening, Mr. President," Hoover said. "I have bad news. Omega is back."

  The frigid winds of Antarctica cut through his heavy coat and the layers of clothing beneath it, making his skin sting. Pryce lifted his gloves to block the pellets of ice from striking his glasses, barely able to see as he forced himself up the glacier. The seasons were just beginning to change and all of the South Pole was covered in dim purple light.

  He hunched forward to remove the map from his heavy backpack, using his body as a shield against the wind. He checked his compass against the map and continued walking.

  An hour later, Pryce collapsed into the snow and could not move. He stayed there so long the sleeves of his coat froze and cracked when he tried to move them. He wiggled out of the two-hundred pound backpack. He checked his compass once more to verify his position. It was the right place. He pulled out a shovel out of the backpack and started to dig through the thick crust.

  By midnight, there were mountains of ice and snow built up on either side of his pit. It was impossible to tell the time of day by the light in the sky because it never changed. He'd dug twelve feet down until he struck a solid layer of ice hard enough to bend the blade of his shovel. Pryce climbed out of the hole and opened his backpack to remove a bundle of dynamite sticks wrapped in waterproof plastic. His lighter refused to work in the wind.

  Come on, something go right just once on this damned excursion.

  He flicked it again and the flame sparked briefly enough to light the fuse. Pryce tossed the dynamite into the hole and turned to run as fast as he could in ankle-deep snow.

  The explosion started an avalanche in that area that filled the air with loose, stinging dust that tore at his face like bees. He shielded himself and headed back to the hole to find his shovel and start digging again.

  Two days later he woke up in the bottom of his hole, covered only by his makeshift igloo of hand-packed ice bricks. He had to cover his eyes with his fingers to protect them from the sun's harsh glare. It seemed to reflect off every possible surface and it felt like his eyes were being eaten away by the cold and bright, inescapable light.