Unkillable

by Dean C. Moore

  “How could he have known what we were thinking just then, sir?” the XO asked.

  “Because he hacked our coms the same way he hacked the rest of the ship, that’s why!” the captain shouted, his emotions getting away from him again. He didn’t like being out of control.

  “With what? His super-duper telepathic brain?”

  “Sufficiently advanced science is indistinguishable from magic,” the captain mumbled, breaking eye contact with the enemy for the first time and staring blankly at his feet.

  “What, sir?”

  “Something Arthur C. Clarke once said, before he went and invented satellites. Too bad he didn’t take the last of his kind with him to the grave.”

  “I’m just hitching a ride, gentlemen, so relax,” The Thing said, leaping up on the sail plane in just one bound.

  “To where?!” the captain blurted, having no intention of being cowered, or of having someone usurp his authority.

  The Thing bounded up to the cop of the com tower so he was now looking down on the captain. “Iceland. You can let me off at the one place you personally don’t care if is blown off the map or not and then you’re welcome to try just that, blow me off the map, that is. You can at least dream about it as a way of staying sane between here and there.”

  “An excellent idea,” the captain crowed. “You heard the man,” he said to the XO. Then he turned back to The Thing. “If you wouldn’t mind returning our vessel to us so we can play taxi driver to you for the duration.”

  “Not at all,” The Thing said calmly.

  The XO pressed the mike into his ear. He nodded and gave the thumbs-up to the captain to confirm that they had control of the sub again.

  The commander of The Nautilus asked The Thing, “What do you call yourself, anyway?”

  “T.U.M. Short for The Unkillable Man.”

  “Ah-huh. But of course.” He gestured for Tum to descend ahead of him on the ladder leading into the sub.

  He mumbled to the XO as he followed Tum down, “Figures the one unkillable man on the planet is defecting to Iceland, home of pacifists so neutral they make the Swiss look like a band of hot-blooded Nazis.”

  “That might be a good thing.”

  “Trust me, it’s a setup. And I want to be two six packs in before the payoff that he’s got in store for us.”

  THIRTY-ONE

  Veronica pulled the earplug out of her ear attached to the iPad in her lap. Both accessories ranked as indulgences since her mindchip could handle both their functions handily. But she usually kept it tasked with more rigorous chores, and besides, she was here to blend. She reached for her boilermaker, her legs stretched out in front of her on the Bahamas beach hotel lounge chair. The drink stood on a small round table separating her seat from Adrian’s.

  “What has you reaching for your boilermaker?” Adrian inquired judiciously and in a cautious tone.

  “Tum has planted the idea in the sub captain’s head that it’s okay to nuke Iceland to get rid of him. That’s where he’s having the sub drop him off.”

  “You hacked the sub?” Adrian realized underestimating any of his girlfriends was never a smart move. But he croaked up the lack of credulity before the rest of his brain could catch up.

  “We have a backdoor built in to allow interoperability and… well, anyway.”

  He had no intention of finishing that thought for her. It seemed to have nothing to do with helping him sleep better at nights.

  “It’s my guess that the nukes won’t harm him,” she said, “but they’ll definitely keep us from going after him. For whatever reason he fears us more than all the governments of the world put together.”

  “That’s because he’s no fool. What are the united governments of the world compared to a gaggle of futurists?”

  “I need to get through to him that even that won’t stop the two of us before he goes through with it.”

  “It won’t?” There was Adrian with that inappropriately disbelieving tone again.

  “Please, the alphabet soup agencies have an answer for everything. Especially if what’s going on is going on in Iceland far enough away from probing eyes.”

  She was typing away on the virtual screen of her ruggedized iPad to make sure Tum got the message.

  “What makes you think he’ll stand down?”

  “I don’t know that he will,” she said without slowing with her typing. “But we’ve got to try. And failing that, we’ve got to reach the captain of that sub and talk him off the cliff.”

  Adrian reached for his boilermaker. He was surprised it took this long to extend an arm its direction.

  “Finish your drink,” she said. “We’ve got to get in gear. This guy has been away from us less than five minutes and he’s already gotten a green light to blow up the only people in the free world worth preserving.”

  He grunted as he emptied the rest of his drink down his gullet, listening to the whiskey glass inside of the beer glass slide down until it tapped his incisors. Quick finger reflexes kept it from knocking out his teeth.

  He burped. “Remember when we felt that way about Americans?”

  “That was before they railroaded Bernie Saunders, the one incorruptible guy in Washington, and there was just no pretending to anyone anymore that we weren’t in bed with Satan.”

  “I hate it when my girlfriends agree with me. Especially the mass murderers. It makes me question my very reason for living.”

  She was up and moving and he had no choice but to follow. He was clueless on how she planned to overtake a nuclear submarine. To say nothing of averting getting themselves nuked in the process of landing in Iceland under the shadow of a “Go” order to level the island country.

  ***

  The captain of the USS Nautilus submarine peered out through his scope at Tum walking across the ice flats of Iceland, not too far from shore. He had taken the sub in closer to land than he should have, but he honestly didn’t mind blowing a hole through the mainland to make way for himself.

  “Captain, all systems appear to be back on line, sir,” his XO whispered in his ear.

  “Excellent. Feel free to empty our nuclear payload on wherever it is that bastard is standing.”

  “Sir, there are over three-hundred-thirty thousand people in Iceland.”

  “They’re all pacifists. Consider it a public service.”

  “You’re joking, right?”

  “Do I look like I’m joking?”

  “No, sir, you look quite mad. The distant, unblinking eyes, the knuckle-cracking. Tum messed with your head but good. I don’t think you should be making any decisions right now, sir, one way or another about the fate of Iceland.”

  “Sir,” the COMMS guy said, cutting in on the XO. “We’re getting a transmission from Veronica.”

  “The chick that’s on every alphabet soup agency’s speed-dial?” The captain chuckled. “I believe I’ve had to avail myself of her services a couple of times myself. Love the woman. Very good for settling the nerves, especially at times like this. Put her through, lieutenant.”

  “Captain?” It was Veronica’s voice.

  “Yes, darling. I’m getting ready to nuke Iceland off the map, but this being you, I figured, what the hell, they could live on borrowed time.”

  “That’s why I’m calling. I think Tum put the idea in your head. I don’t think the nuclear fallout will do a damn thing to him. I think it’s meant to stop us from getting to him. I don’t know what he’s got planned but whatever it is, he’s looking to put a lot of distance between him and the powers that be.”

  “When you say ‘us,’ Veronica, who do you mean exactly, at least this time out?”

  “I’m working with the futurist division of the FBI. We’ve got the woman who built this guy working for us now. We believe we stand the best chance of bringing him down. I think Tum does too or he wouldn’t be looking to put up a wall of nuclear fallout between us and him.”

  For a time, the fate of the world hung on dead air. />
  “I don’t know, Veronica. I owe you. But quite frankly, this guy scares me and I think I owe the world more.”

  “Twenty-four hours, captain, that’s all I’m asking, then you can do what the hell you want.”

  The only thing more stifling than the dead air on the line was the captain’s grip on his mike.

  “Christ, Veronica, you should see what this guy did in twenty-four seconds.”

  “I’m well aware, captain. There is a frightful amount of people and resources at the Futurist’s branch of the FBI that he’s managed to totally misdirect every step of the way. I’m afraid he could easily do the same at a global level by pitting the national governments against one another the second you inform your high command. Adrian and I are the only ones he hasn’t been able to shake. Perhaps because he didn’t factor us into his plans.”

  Dead silence leaked into COMMS once again as the captain mulled over his options.

  It was his XO staring at all his hand wringing that brought him out of his fugue God knows how much later; it made him feel embarrassed for being this out of it at such a crucial juncture. His XO was right; he didn’t trust his own judgement right now. Maybe an excuse to forestall making a decision wasn’t such a bad idea. “Twenty-four hours, Veronica. Then I kickoff the Armageddon fireworks by lighting up Iceland.”

  He gestured to the COMMS guy to kill the link.

  He did.

  ***

  Ed stormed into Klepsky’s office. He brought himself to attention as if he were coming before his boot camp drill sergeant, down to clicking his heels on the floor. “Sir, I’ve taken the liberty of bombing us back into the Stone Age.”

  Klepsky rose from his chair like a man twenty years younger. “You’ve what?”

  “All the back channel COMMS we use to hold this department together, sir, keep everyone connected, and to maintain the dragnet about Adrian, it’s all down, sir.”

  “What the hell are you up to, Ed? And talk fast before your beating takes place a little early.”

  “Really, sir?” Ed said excitedly. “Don’t tease.” He sobered when he got a look at Klepsky’s latest expression, brought himself back to attention. “Ah, my thinking is this, sir. I believe the reason Tum has been able to keep us chasing our tails is that he’s hacked his way into our computers, cell phones, PDAs, anything electronic. So if we’re to get him out of our hair...”

  Klepsky was nodding even before the lecture was over. “Very well, Ed,” he said like a beaten man, ashamed for not thinking of it himself. Tum had a way of eroding one’s self-confidence regarding one’s control over one’s destiny. He was just going to have to snap out of it.

  “One more thing, sir. It’s not going to be enough simply to disable the equipment. We have to pull every damn plug and bury the stuff down in some basement somewhere. Even deactivated, these days, smart devices can be used for monitoring.”

  “Yes, yes, of course,” Klepsky said absently. “See to it.” He thought he’d fold like an accordion. He should be screaming from the highest rooftop, “I’ve not yet begun to fight!” but instead he felt too emotionally beaten to hold himself up.

  “One more thing, sir.”

  “What now, Ed?!”

  “I’m afraid I have to frisk you, sir. And keep frisking you, random frisks, sir.” He giggled nervously.

  “What are you…? Oh.”

  “Yes, sir, I’m afraid your kleptomania could be a loophole in my brilliant strategy. Who knows what you might feel compelled to stick in your pockets?”

  “I haven’t snatched a thing since my wife stopped smashing breakables over my head! It was just a way to balance my checkbook.”

  Ed hit him with the “yeah, sure” face.

  Klepsky sighed and his body slumped. “Very well, Ed. Get on with it.”

  Ed came over and frisked him and tried not to get turned on and to maintain his professionalism. He was doing a half decent job of it, to his credit. Klepsky put his big meaty palms on his ass anyway, squeezed hard and brought him in for another wet, long kiss, with Ed cooing with pleasure the whole time.

  He was as red-faced as ever when Klepsky let him go, looking about the department to see who was ogling them. But, also to his credit, Ed had kept searching his pockets the whole time. He pulled out a votive candle. “From the golem presentation at the gothic cathedral? Nice snatch and grab. I might hold on to this one. It’s art-deco.”

  Ed picked out a bloody dagger from one of Klepsky’s inside trench coat pockets next. Smelled it. “From the Katz deli. I’m sure you were tempted to use it on Rory, sir, and not the wife,” he said obligingly, before setting it down on the desk.

  “If only I were,” Klepsky mumbled.

  Ed held up the knob from a kitchen drawer that had come out of the latest pocket he’d ventured into. “From the empty apartment where you found golem number 2? Impressive, considering the place was unfurnished, so had little to offer, and you blew it up.”

  “In my defense, the wife broke the handle reaching in the kitchen drawer for something else to throw at me, back when she could still summon the passion to do so. Before the numbness set in. And the silent treatment. And she figured it would be more effective to walk around the apartment pale as a ghost, haunting me from beyond the grave. Even before she was in the grave.”

  Ed sighed relief. “That’s it, sir,” he said, putting an end to the frisk. “Oh, wait… Nearly forgot.”

  He held up Klepsky’s cell phone at the end. “The only thing of any real note.”

  Klepsky groaned. “I suppose behavior mod takes time, even for the most determined-to-mend-our-ways of us.”

  Ed leaned into Klepsky. “Excellent job trying to distract me earlier, sir, with the frisk.” He leaned back, balancing on his heels again.

  “I wasn’t trying to distract you, Ed.”

  “Really? So, this is another reward then?”

  “Just a real believer in B. F. Skinner, Ed.”

  Ed smiled. The intellectual nerd that he was, the reference to the doctor who had invented behavioral conditioning wasn’t at all lost on him. “I can see that,” he said smiling. “Usually I hate being manipulated, being made to do tricks for treats, but in this case…” he leaned in again to whisper, “manipulate away.” He giggled and ran out of his office with Klepsky’s cell phone, and his computer, ripped off the surface of his desk almost as an afterthought.

  Outside Klepsky’s office there was a whirl of confusion and disgruntlement as people tried to get cell phones, PDAs, and computers to work that refused to work. “Every electronic device to the basement, people, now. No exceptions!” Ed barked. “We’re going old school until Tum is neutralized. Nothing but paper and pencil and your encyclopedic memories from here on out.”

  There were collective groans over which erupted a fair amount of cursing. But ultimately there was also begrudging resignation and compliance. That was because nerds had their own pecking order irrespective of who held what title; in their case, everything went according to a meritocracy. And in their world, Ed was king, as he was the smartest big picture thinker of them all. Unless Adrian was standing in the room, of course. The rest of them could lay claim to being slightly better than him in any given specialty, but he was the guy who put the puzzle pieces together. The guy who would have Adrian’s job someday when Adrian aged out.

  THIRTY-TWO

  Veronica made use of her military contacts to commandeer them a hypersonic jet plane that soared at five times the speed of sound — faster than a bullet. Built off the earlier X-51A prototype, since heavily modified, it was affectionately referred to as The Waverider. Several billion had been spent perfecting the craft. Adrian could attest to the fact that they didn’t waste any of that money on creature comforts. But it did have an off-the-charts stealth rating that allowed it to slip under another country’s radar—something that was always useful when infringing on territorial rights and national security. More to the point, they were hoping it’d keep them off Tum�
��s radar as well.

  There was also the matter of escaping the dragnet forever about Adrian. Not all of those guys were FBI-FD and not all of them were of the mind that stopping Tum was a good thing. Even if they hadn’t given his stalkers the slip, one advantage of flying a hyperplane was that it gave him and Veronica a hell of a lead on them.

  She deaccelerated the plane, which felt something like the Starship Enterprise dropping out of warp factor 9 to subspace speeds, just ahead of the Icelandic coast, and from there glided them to a stop on skis instead of wheels—another alteration made to fit their needs—this one a bit more slapdash. They were both hoping the last-second modifications would hold. They didn’t mind sacrificing the plane; they were a bit more squeamish about sacrificing themselves.

  The craft skidded to a stop in about the distance they gave navy jets to come to a complete standstill on an aircraft carrier. Of course, they didn’t have a snag line to help slow the plane. As it turned out, increasingly soft snow sufficed when they ran out of hard-packed ice. It continued to pile up in front of them and over them, pushed by the nose of the craft until it became an impenetrable wall.

  They tunneled their way out like bears during the first melt of spring. The analogy lost its appeal once they ran smack into the endless sea of ice and rock and freezing wind and blistering snow drifts at the mouth of the tunnel. Spring this was not. More like eternal winter—on Pluto. They were banking on the white surface of the craft keeping it camouflaged enough. But this was even better. They’d literally buried all evidence of their landing without even trying.

  “You think we managed to stay off this guy’s radar?” Adrian asked, as they hiked away from the hypersonic jet, sacrificing their windshield in the process. Something told him that was just the first of a succession of bitter realities to come.

  “Hard to say. Probably not if he made us a priority. We have to hope we’re too insignificant in his cosmic scheme of things to keep a constant check on us.”