Undetectable (Great Minds Thriller)

by M. C. Soutter

  After all, it sounded very close to “almost ready.”

  Kevin Brooks felt a hand on his shoulder, and he took in a slow, cautious breath.

  Better.

  The pain was still there – he was still aching, still bruised and battered – but now it was livable. Now he felt as though he had put himself through an especially hard lifting workout the day before. He wouldn’t be winning any races for the next few days, but at least he didn’t feel crippled.

  “What time is it?”

  “Ten o’clock, Sunday morning.”

  Kevin put the book he had been reading, Antimicrobial Therapy, on the floor beside the couch, and he swung himself around and up onto his feet.

  “Feeling more spry this morning I see,” Andrew said.

  Kevin grunted half-heartedly. “Almost.”

  After breakfast, he went to the study. Something was different this morning, something in his head. He had reached some critical point, some key level of information gathering, and all at once he felt as if his mind were bubbling over. There were so many books in him now, so many instruction manuals and science textbooks and practical guides to everything from building a wooden shelter to applying advanced game theory, that he was suddenly aware of a need to do, to actually try some of the things he had been absorbing over the last few nights. Fixing freezers and talking about handguns had whetted some of that appetite the day before, but now the need was much stronger.

  He sat down in the study and took out a piece of paper. Without waiting or even thinking very hard, he grabbed a pen from the cup on the corner of the desk and began to write. It was almost like watching someone else work. In a few minutes – it felt like a few minutes, but he had stopped worrying about time – the page was covered with a detailed overhead view of what looked like a city apartment. Kevin sat back and took a moment to look at it, and then he put the page to the side.

  Next.

  A clean sheet of paper, and he let his arm go again. This time he was drawing a piece of equipment, something smooth and metal and small. He kept drawing; now making little tick marks on the side of the page to indicate scale, now adding shading to the metal piece to give it depth. To make it shine.

  “What is that?”

  Kevin glanced behind him to find Andrew standing there, peering down at the drawing with evident interest. “Is it a carabineer?”

  Kevin took a second to look at the picture he had drawn. And to think. “No, its – ” He paused. “Well, yes. For climbing. But it doesn’t exist. Not yet.”

  “What’s this bend here? That doesn’t look familiar.”

  “Right, that’s the difference. That transfers the load away from the main joint. Distributes it better throughout the piece.”

  Andrew peered at the picture uncertainly for another moment, and then he seemed to remember why he had come into the room. “Anything to eat?”

  “How long have I been in here?”

  “Hour and a half.”

  “Good. No, I’m okay.”

  Andrew nodded and left him alone. Kevin brought out a fresh sheet of paper. He was picking up speed now. He wrote out an algorithm for winning at blackjack. Then a chemical formula for an artificial sweetener. Next he designed a small wing attachment for an airliner, the purpose for which he briefly lost sight of until he imagined the laminar flow pattern over a standard airfoil, realizing as he did so that this attachment would reduce the likelihood of stall at low speeds. In another minute he found himself making five straight lines across the page, then another five just below them. Then again and again, until he had a page completely covered by five-and-five groups of horizontal lines. He was utterly lost until he went to the top and began filling in notes.

  For a moment he was delighted with himself. But when he was done making quarter notes and sixteenth notes and dotted halves, he realized he still didn’t know what he had made.

  “Andrew!”

  The assistant appeared a moment later. “Sir?”

  “Can you play the piano?”

  “Of course.”

  Kevin smiled. He wanted to give the man a hug and ask him what he couldn’t do, but instead he handed over his latest sheet of paper. “Is this a piece you’ve seen?”

  Andrew frowned with concentration, and he began moving his head in time to an unheard rhythm. “No,” he said at last. “It’s interesting.” He waited a beat, then shrugged. “But of course it’s unplayable.”

  “What? No, why can’t you – ”

  “Because I don’t have thirteen fingers,” Andrew said, pointing to an especially crowded section of the piece. “You’re aware of that limitation, I assume?” He handed the paper back to Kevin, who stared at it as though it had betrayed him.

  “Maybe it’s a duet,” Kevin suggested.

  “Not unless you’re planning on the two players strangling each other. There’s no room to maneuver here.”

  “Well, but they could just – ”

  “Do you play the piano?”

  “No.”

  “It’s unplayable.”

  “Okay.”

  Andrew walked righteously from the room, his head held high.

  Kevin sighed and returned to his work. Clearly there were certain things – street fighting and musical composition, for example – that required experience to master. But other things required only knowledge. Raw, unfiltered knowledge. And Kevin had good command of a few such things.

  Quite a few.

  He Was Trailing Me

  After three hours of writing and designing and creating, Kevin felt some of the urgency begin to drain out of him. He took a breath and looked at the edge of the desk, which was now stacked with dozens of pages of work.

  Pretty good for a Sunday.

  Today he was doing it right. For probably the first time since this whole business had started. He had rested enough, eaten enough, and worked enough. He thought Dr. Petak would be pleased with him. And now it was time for exercise again.

  A schedule. Check it out. Just like a normal person.

  He changed and left without Andrew giving him any grief, for which he was thankful. And when he reached the park loop he found that he could jog without serious pain. He was still too slow, and there were still too many places on him that felt sore, but his condition had definitely improved. After a few miles he wanted to go still faster, but there were parts of his legs that seemed reluctant. Drawing on an old technique from college, he tried turning around and running backward for a few steps, hoping this might loosen up a few more muscles. The world spun briefly around as he turned, and now he was looking at the people running behind him.

  He saw a face he recognized.

  The doorman.

  It was that chiseled, athletic-looking man from three nights ago. He was trailing Kevin by no more than twenty yards, and staring right at him. Kevin stopped in his tracks, and the man froze.

  “Wait!” Kevin yelled.

  But the man spun around and was off, running like a frightened deer. Kevin swore and gave chase, but the man was simply too quick. He was off the loop and headed for the street in no time, and though Kevin ran as fast as he could, ran and forced himself to ignore the popping twinges coming from his hamstrings, he could not keep up for more than a few seconds. The man leapt over the short wall between the park’s edge and Fifth Avenue as though it were nothing but a high hurdle, and in another moment he was sprinting uptown and away.

  Kevin stood and watched him disappear into the distance, and then he became aware of several spots of pain coming from his legs.

  Several new spots.

  “Oh, come on,” he said, looking down at himself with disgust. He slapped at his legs as though they were a pair of dogs who had misbehaved. “It was only for a second,” he protested.

  He hobbled slowly back home, trying to stretch his legs as he walked. It was a feeling he was familiar with – coming back too soon after an injury – but now that feeling was mixed with a renewed sense of uneasiness.
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br />   As soon as he was back in the apartment, Kevin headed for his bedroom. He found his cell phone on the dresser, called up the contacts list, and then found the listing that would connect him to Petak.

  Doctor.

  He pushed the contact and put the phone to his ear. As before, there was an answer even before the sound of ringing on the other side.

  “Yes?”

  Kevin recognized the voice, and he didn’t bother with pleasantries. “There’s a guy following me, Doctor.” He was immediately angry, immediately indignant. “Following me. Like a hound dog, this guy. But three times as fast. You said I was just paranoid. You said the voices in my head were making me think I was seeing people, seeing conspiracies that weren’t really there. But I just saw my doorman, my doorman who disappeared into thin air three nights ago when I tried to go back and talk to him, and this time he was following me in the park. Why would he be doing that, Doctor?”

  There was pause on the line, and then Petak’s voice came back, calm and smooth as ever. “Let me see if I understand. You feel that doormen should not be allowed to go on jogs in the park?”

  “No, that’s – ”

  “It’s a Sunday afternoon,” Petak said pleasantly. “If it weren’t for our special payment arrangement, I might be taking a jog right now. We might even have encountered each other. Would you have suspected me then?”

  “No, but what I’m saying is – ”

  “You believe, essentially, that any person you encounter away from his or her place of business must be stalking you, correct?”

  “That’s not what – ”

  “Listen to what you’re saying, Kevin. There’s no – ”

  “He ran away from me!”

  That did the trick. The line went silent, and Kevin felt a brief surge of triumph. “That’s right,” he continued. “He was trailing me. He froze when I saw him. And then when I tried to talk to him, he sprinted away from me like a 400-meter Olympic hopeful. What do you say to that?”

  There was a long pause, and Kevin wondered if Petak had hung up. The idea filled him with unexpected dread. He didn’t want the man gone; he just wanted an explanation. “Doctor?”

  “I’m here, Kevin.” Petak’s tone had changed dramatically. “I must say, I’m very sorry to hear this.”

  “What?”

  The doctor sighed loudly. “It sounds to me as though the people who put you through this procedure are still interested in your… condition. And they’re following up. I can understand your distress.”

  “What do you mean, following up? I thought you said I wasn’t chosen.”

  “You weren’t, but that doesn’t mean they’re going to let all that data slip through their fingers.”

  “Data?” Kevin glanced down at himself as if expecting to find a printout coming from a hidden slot in his chest. “What data?”

  “You, Kevin. The side effects you’re experiencing, the steps you’re taking to handle those effects – these things are worth studying. From what you told me two months ago, the procedure you submitted to was experimental at best. Which means its long-term effects are probably not yet fully understood. I can’t say this for sure, but I’m betting your doorman – or whoever that man is – has simply been tasked with trying to keep track of you during your convalescence. In other words, to watch you and report what he sees. Not very sinister, but I can sympathize with your frustration.”

  “That’s bullshit,” Kevin said angrily. He felt like throwing the cell phone across the room. “Why doesn’t he just ask me about it? Or ask you? Between the two of us, we could give him all the data he wants.

  “Again, I simply don’t know. Perhaps he’s trying to record unbiased observations. To watch without interfering, though it sounds as if he’s not doing a very good job. And perhaps he will ask you; or he’ll ask me, or both of us. Maybe he’ll contact us in two weeks with a whole list of questions.”

  “I don’t think I’ll be too eager to help out.”

  “That’s certainly your prerogative,” Petak said. “And you can be sure he’ll get no information from me.”

  “All right, so what now?”

  “Try to forget about him. I’m much more concerned with you. How are you feeling? Have you been keeping up a schedule? Acting normal?”

  Kevin smiled. “So normal. I’m just a regular old paranoid, insomniac, voice-hearing, time-stopping, steel-trap-memory guy. If you saw me on the street you wouldn’t look twice.”

  “Good. And how’s your energy? You’re getting rest? How are you feeling overall?”

  “Not bad. I got my ass kicked yesterday, but I seem to be healing well.”

  “What?”

  “Never mind. I’m fine.”

  “Okay.” Petak seemed unsure whether Kevin was joking. “Call me again if you need anything.”

  “Can you figure out who that doorman guy is? Get him to fuck off?”

  “I wish I could,” Petak said. “Check in with me sometime this week. Give me an update.”

  “I will.”

  Petak waited for a slow count of five after the connection was broken, and then he was dialing another number. He could have pressed a contact on his phone, but he preferred to punch in each digit individually. He knew this one by heart.

  “What?”

  It was Craig.

  “Are you out of your fucking mind?” Petak shouted.

  “Oh, calm down.”

  “Listen, Craig the fucking Craig, or whatever your name is. You’re freaking him out, do you understand? If you can’t tail a man any better than that, then cut it out. Back off immediately.”

  “Sorry, Doctor. Can’t do that.”

  “And why not?”

  “You know why not. Because keeping tabs on him is my job. I need to know his status at all times. And right now his status is shit. Were you aware of that, by the way?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “He was beaten up yesterday. It was only three guys,” Craig said with disdain. “A twelve-year-old girl could have handled herself better. And you should have seen him half an hour ago – slow as a mule.”

  “He doesn’t need to be a cheetah, you asshole. He’s a tank. If he can keep his stamina up, that’s all that matters. But with you on his ass all the time, who knows if he’ll go back to the park? Who knows if he’ll even go running anymore? Do you realize how difficult it is to implant an impulse for a man that size to go for a fucking jog? He weighs 220, it’s completely against his nature; it’s like trying to convince a cat to swim the backstroke.”

  “Fine, but that’s not the real problem.”

  Petak huffed. “Please. As for the street fight, what do you expect? He’s got five days to go. Five days. He could learn to do open heart surgery by then if we handed him the right book. Do you have the slightest idea of how much a scrubbed agent can absorb in that much time?”

  “He’s not going to – ”

  “More than all the shit currently rattling around in that skull of yours,” Petak cut in. “You should see the bookcase we set up for him. You’ll never read that many books in your whole miserable life.”

  Craig scoffed. “Not the point,” he said. “And in any case, I’m not responsible for an asset’s safety this coming Friday. He’s the one who has to be ready. I have to make a call.”

  “What? There’s nothing to report. Just give him until – ”

  But the phone was dead in Petak’s hand. Craig was gone.

  Craig was still on the sidewalk. He had switched directions several times after leaving the park, on the off-chance that Kevin Brooks hadn’t given up trying to track him down. But now he was walking straight downtown on Third Avenue. He had his cellphone pressed to his ear.

  “It’s Craig.”

  He waited for clearance.

  “This is an official report,” Craig said, speaking slowly and clearly for the recorders he knew would be rolling. “He might not be ready in time. He’s currently injured. Not badly, but there’s n
o way to know if he’ll be 100% by Friday. And his hand-to-hand abilities are questionable.”

  A pause.

  “Yes,” Craig said, “improvements are likely. But my recommendation as of now is to go with the backup as lead agent.”

  He waited a moment for confirmation, and then he put the phone back in his pocket. Craig hadn’t much liked Kevin Brooks during the scrubbing process; in fact, the whole concept of the program rubbed him the wrong way.