Undead

by Ryan W. Aslesen

  “Yes, I’m hoping you might.” She spoke softly with no accent, in the soothing tone of a hypnotist. “I just purchased a gun, my first ever, and I’m having a difficult time mastering it.”

  “It’s not something you learn overnight.” Max couldn’t believe Sharp had let someone this green onto the range in his absence. He’s gambling when he should be taking care of business. “Have you had any sort of training?”

  “I attended a basic safety course. I know how the gun operates.”

  “It’s not a gun, it’s a semi-automatic pistol. And seeing as how Sharp let you in, you should talk to him about lessons. There are some excellent instructors here, champion match shooters.”

  “Perhaps, but I’ve never seen anyone shoot as well as you.” She pointed to the several ruined targets Max had discarded on the floor, the innards and brainpans of simulated, silhouetted foes blasted to oblivion.

  “Everyone has their talents. Now, if you’ll—”

  “Would you mind terribly giving me a few pointers? I hate to impose, but I really wish to master this weapon. I would ask Mr. Sharp, but I have to leave soon for work.”

  No. He hadn’t the time, still needed to complete more sets and finish off his ammo. What I should do is throw you out of here for incompetence. He would have a few choice words for Sharp the pussy-monger next time he saw him. Ready to refuse, he sighed, looked up at her... and changed his mind. He couldn’t put his finger on exactly why, but when most gorgeous women would have put on a seductive show to sway him to acquiescence—pouty lips, bedroom eyes, suggestive postures—she appeared all business. Perhaps she really did desire to master her weapon.

  “All right, I can spare you a few minutes.”

  “Thank you. I greatly appreciate it.”

  They moved over to lane 18. The last target she’d used had more random holes blown through it than a Mississippi road sign. Max ripped the target down and sent a new burglar out to five yards, a realistic training distance for home and personal defense. He took her out of her improper shooting stance and instructed her in proper body alignment to the target. Most beginners thought shooting was mostly about keen eyesight, though it was only one of many qualities that made a skilled marksman.

  “When shooting regular iron sights, like the ones on your SIG, your eyes need to focus on the sights alone. The target will be blurry, since the human eye can only focus on one distance at a time. If you keep at it long enough, you will eventually not even use the sights and learn to shoot instinctively at the target. That takes a lot of practice, so for today let’s just focus on the fundamentals.”

  Max taught her the basics of proper breathing and to squeeze the trigger instead of jerking it. His ten-minute crash course produced laudable results. A dozen shots from her first two mags struck the burglar’s vitals. Her groupings were loose, however, but every shot struck the paper at least. More than she could have boasted half an hour before.

  “Should I try some head shots?” she asked. “I saw you doing them before.”

  “No, at your level you should concentrate on the body. It’s your best chance of disabling your adversary.”

  “If that is the case, why practice head shots at all?”

  “Body armor.” Don’t ask me to elaborate. She did not. “I need to finish my exercises. Keep your weapon clean and stick with it. You’ll master it soon enough.” He turned and started back to his lane.

  “Thanks, Max.”

  Max stopped in his tracks. He turned slowly. “How did you know my name? I never mentioned it.” Perhaps Sharp had mentioned it to her, but he quickly dismissed the thought.

  So this is what it’s come to. Agents had been following him ever since the Alaska mission. He’d confronted one of them, a guy who blew his cover while stalking Max in a restaurant. Fed up with their bullshit, Max disarmed him in the restroom and gave him an old-fashioned beat down. He turned out to be FBI, and they didn’t stop tailing him after that. The CIA, his employer for many years, followed him too, no doubt. Unfortunately, he hadn’t gotten another chance to corner another agent and make the stupid bastard question his profession.

  Until now.

  She didn’t answer his question but rather shot a sneaky child’s evil grin at him. She then turned and emptied a mag into the burglar’s chest in a group so tight that he appeared to have taken only one shot to the heart—from a 30mm cannon. Max couldn’t have done better himself.

  “I’m a quick study,” she said as she ejected the mag onto the bench.

  “The hell you are. And you’re damn lucky you don’t have a swingin’ dick, or you’d be choking on it.”

  “So, I hear. And I don’t even receive hazard pay for dealing with you.”

  “Best not deal with me again. You won’t like the outcome.”

  Her tinkling laugh belonged to a society debutante, not a government agent. “I’m not here to tail you, Max; that’s child’s play. I’ve come to put you back to work.”

  “No thanks. I’m not a government mule anymore. I work for myself.”

  “Not lately you haven’t.”

  “Minor setback. I’ve weathered them before.”

  “No need to weather it any longer. This assignment is tailor-made for your talents.”

  “Okay, this is getting really fucking tedious, honey, so I’ll say it again: I. Am. Not. Interested. Now respect that and get the hell out of here.”

  Her mocking stare never flinched. “Would it sway you if I said I know about Alaska?”

  “You don’t know shit about anything.”

  Max was through with her. He turned and marched to his lane and started packing up his gear. Send a beautiful woman after me? Fucking bush-league government move. For an organization supposedly staffed by the best and brightest, the FBI operated with all the organization of a flea circus. He heard the heels of her black leather riding boots clopping down the aisle toward him. Keep walking, right out that door.

  Instead she stopped behind him and stood there. She’d shrugged on a black Ducati motorcycle jacket and a backpack loaded with her shooting gear. “I wouldn’t say I don’t know shit about anything. I know you were supposed to find something up there, but you never located it.”

  So you’re CIA. Max knew she spoke of Greytech’s missing hard drives, the ones containing all the data their scientists had collected on the alien substance before it morphed into the beasts that wiped out Base Camp.

  “Ancient history. Couldn’t give a shit less.” Max had almost finished packing his equipment. In his mind the conversation was over.

  “And if I could offer you information on the late Peter Banner?”

  Max turned to confront her once more, yet found himself at a loss for words.

  “I thought that might grab your attention. You’re as tough as they say, but I like ’em hard to get.”

  I fucking hate this. Was it true or just more poisoned bait to lure him back into black ops? He had no idea as he stared down the impassive agent. She had a poker face that rivaled Lance Thompson’s, Max’s late friend and former second in command of his team, killed and then vaporized in Alaska.

  “Who says you’ve got me?”

  “Take this.” She extended a business card to him between her index and middle fingers. “And call me if you’re interested.”

  He read the card: Juniper Reyes, Acquisitions, Ajax Importers Inc. Los Angeles. Juniper? It was all bullshit, of course, except for the phone number. Banner, his old CIA boss, had worked under the guise of a dummy company called Persian Rug Liquidators. What mental midget comes up with these ridiculous fronts?

  “Don’t count on it,” Max said, but she’d departed. He caught a glimpse of her fine ass as she exited the firing line. “God dammit.” He finished packing up and left.

  He ran into her again outside as he headed for his truck. She waved at him from the saddle of
her motorcycle. “Thanks again for the shooting tips, Max. Top notch.” She raised a gloved hand and gave him a thumbs-up.

  Her last laugh rang out from inside her helmet before she slammed the visor down and rocketed away. She popped a wheelie, blazed through the parking lot, and brought the bike back to two wheels as she hit the street. The rear tire screeched, and rubber burned as she revved the engine and blasted off to do whatever CIA agents did all day.

  Acquire things, didn’t you read her card?

  To Juniper Reyes, or whatever the hell her name was, he was exactly that—a thing, a tool she needed to accomplish a nefarious objective dreamed up by some Ivy League genius at Langley.

  Is this really what you want? Max asked himself as he drove off in his pickup. Regarding the hard drives, the answer was no. There’s no more of that “substance” left. Why does it matter? What could be on those drives that would interest the CIA? He didn’t know, and remained true to not giving a shit about it.

  More information regarding the late Peter Banner, however, did pique his interest. And what swamp of shit will I have to wade through to get it, if she’s even telling the truth? For her sake, he hoped she was. He was not a forgiving man when it came to information on Banner, the man who had literally destroyed his family. He would have the truth, or she would answer for her lies.

  “You’ll regret this,” Max muttered as he sat at a stoplight. Are you telling her or yourself?

  In truth, he had no idea.

  3

  Through the smoked glass window wall in his office, General Hyung-Lee Moon admired the panoramic view of the lush, green valley below. An odd feeling—almost satisfaction and not quite fulfillment—flooded the tiny nether region of his brain that housed his soul. Not yet... soon. Weeks, perhaps even days. From his lofty vantage point—the installation he commanded stood atop a ridge at the edge of a six hundred-foot cliff—he looked upon the rugged crags of the Hamgyong Range. While the mountains sloughed off their coats of summer greenery, he pondered the great progress being made in the labs below, far beneath the earth. History in the making. Of all the dedicated men who had toiled to bring this struggle to fruition, General Moon would perhaps be recorded as the man who finally put North Korea on an equal footing with the capitalist oppressors in the West. First, we unite our land. And then we dominate the world.

  The Americans had a trite expression for multitasking: killing two birds with one stone. I would rather use a shotgun and kill three. And so he would. However, at the moment, one of the birds was a phony, a clay pigeon that the Supreme Leader had made a priority since it dealt with his own physical well-being. Though General Moon would never say it, the Supreme Leader’s greed disgusted him. A young man still, not even thirty-five, dabbling in dreams of immortality as his state is ridiculed daily on the world stage.

  The sun disappeared behind a cloud, and Moon considered his reflection that appeared in the window. He’d spent more time in the army than the Supreme Leader had spent on the earth. He could appreciate the rousing propaganda generated by the Supreme Leader: his provocative speeches and truculent missives that so infuriated the West. Words, however, were the limit of his capabilities.

  Though he held the official title of Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces and was often referred to in military circles as the Marshal, Kim Jong-un had never shot anyone who could have possibly returned fire. Kim had grown up behind thick, protective walls, while Moon had been fighting for the life of his state—fighting for his life period. He had the scar to prove it: a thick, straight line of white that ran from the right corner of his mouth, all the way back to his ear.

  He’d earned the grisly knife wound while guarding the border as a young lieutenant, in a hand-to-hand fight with a squad of ROK Marines who had dared to infiltrate for a reconnaissance mission. His platoon killed all of the Marines save one, some in battle and others by immediate execution upon their surrender. The lone survivor, the man who scarred Moon, was remanded to a forced labor camp, a fate far worse than death.

  Moon glanced at the memorandum atop the blotter on his imposing desk, constructed of the finest grain of Japanese cherry. I bleed and serve, while you languish and demand. One day, perhaps, the Supreme Leader would have his immortality. But Moon would have it as well, and he would put it to far more constructive use.

  The Supreme Leader’s numerous grandiose titles occupied over half of the one-page memorandum. Moon now ignored the paper and considered the other two birds to be killed, each of far greater importance to the regime, even if the Supreme Leader did not believe so. If I can achieve initial weaponization of the virus within two weeks, the Supreme Leader will forget about his immortality for a bit, in his furor to attack the South. Dealing with Kim was much like catering to a spoiled child who made incessant demands, only to be distracted when some other bauble glittered before him.

  The second bird would be a gift from the West, if his sources were correct. They always were.

  An electric chime sounded. Moon consulted his analog tactical watch, a fine precision instrument produced by North Korean light industry that he synchronized daily to atomic time. It was now five seconds to 0900. He pressed the button on his desk that opened the office door, which was soundproofed with a thick layer of leather upholstery.

  Dr. Kwang-Soo Park entered his lavish office: an erect, bespectacled figure who looked every inch the scientist in his pressed and pristine white lab coat. While the facility’s other researchers, all younger men, carried computer tablets to record their data and notes, Dr. Park still relied on a fountain pen and a pad of yellow paper.

  A man of the old school, these are the hardest men to deal with. Moon could appreciate that fact since he also considered himself part of an older, harder generation that could operate without the crutch of technology. Though Moon knew that Dr. Park could never survive the minefields of party politics. When addressing the Supreme Leader and his delusional apparatchiks, Moon always knew what to say and exactly when to say it. Dr. Park, however, resided in a rigid world of statistical data, and dealings with the facility’s chief research scientist required a bit more thought.

  “Good morning, Dr. Park. Long live the Supreme Leader.”

  Park, who now stood before his desk, nodded and said, “And to you as well, general. Long live the Supreme Leader.”

  “Many say it, but it is indeed our purpose here, doctor.”

  Park nodded yet said nothing. As usual, Moon saw his eyes dance a couple of times, stealing glances at the grandeur of the office. He does not approve. True party men rarely did, and Park still numbered among them despite his covert duplicity. When not in residence at the research facility, Dr. Park lived alone in a crumbling, stinking apartment complex in Pyongyang, where he’d resided for over thirty years. Moon’s office, with its cherry paneling, antique Persian rugs, and crystal chandelier, likely offended the fool. Typical.

  Savvy party men who had worked their way to the top knew how to manage the trappings of power without becoming addicted to them, like Western pigs. This is what differentiates a leader from a drone.

  Moon walked a few feet to a seventeenth-century Japanese sideboard that featured a lacquered scene on top, of two fully armored samurai sparring with katanas. He poured thirty-year-old scotch whiskey over ice, in a heavy crystal tumbler. “Would you care for a drink, doctor?”

  “No, thank you, general.”

  “Of course,” Moon said in feigned self-admonishment. “I have forgotten you do not drink alcohol. Please pardon an old man’s deplorable memory.”

  It was a game he liked to play. How many meetings since last I asked? According to his sources, Park had given up drinking some fifteen years previous. Moon wondered briefly, as he always did, what he would do if Park one day accepted the offer. Give him a drink. Maybe he works faster when he’s drunk. And if he doesn’t and the projects fail, the blame is on him. No one rose to Moon’s status with
out first mastering the blame game.

  Moon returned to his desk and paused to savor a sip of the forbidden Western whiskey. The liquor disappointed him. Too peaty, it tasted like a dirty ashtray. Nevertheless, he made a show of swishing and swallowing the scotch and smacked his lips in the aftermath. He placed the sweating glass on a brass coaster atop the desk.

  “Now, your status report,” Moon said.

  Dr. Park began to speak, stopped, and cleared his throat noisily several times. “General, we have succeeded in isolating the carbon—”

  “No lab-speak today, Dr. Park. I grow bored with your stonewalling, as does the Supreme Leader!” Scowling, he placed his hands on the desk blotter and leaned closer to Park, cocking his head slightly to accentuate his scar, a move that always intimidated the humble scientist. Only the most intrepid of men could unflinchingly face his redoubtable countenance.

  “My apologies, General Moon.”

  “Do you see this memorandum from the Supreme Leader on my desk, Dr. Park?”

  “I do, general.”

  “And did you receive one as well?”

  “I did, general.”

  “And what does the memorandum say?”

  “That the Supreme Leader demands to witness a test of the longevity elixir within the next two weeks.”

  “Yes. Will this be possible?”

  “Yes, general.”

  It cannot be possible. Moon affixed incredulous eyes upon Park. “Will it? Are you certain that your concoction will work to proper effect?”

  Park did not gulp audibly, but Moon saw his Adam’s apple bob once. Sweat beaded his brow below his disheveled shock of gray hair. “It will work, general. You have my guarantee.”

  Moon allowed himself a low chuckle. “But I have other things as well, and of far greater value than your guarantee. Things that, if refined and properly presented to the Supreme Leader, may make him forget for a while his desire to live forever. For both of our sakes, I suggest you double your research on weaponization of the virus you have produced from the data.”