Point And Shoot Part 6

"We're plunging out of low earth orbit," the Other Hardie said, "not going down a log flume. It's going to hurt. You're never going to experience pain quite like this. Or so they told me during the briefing."

Hardie had to admit, he didn't think about coming down so much. It had hurt enough going up; he kind of blocked the whole idea of coming down out of his head.

"Let's just say I let you strap yourself in with that harness. You'll be nice and cozy. What am I supposed to do? Hang on and pray?"

"No. There's somewhere else we could strap you."

"Where? This isn't a two-seater."

Hardie followed his clone's eye path across the craft and over ... to the cramped toilet facilities. The only other place where a gentleman could strap himself in for the extended haul.

"Oh, f.u.c.k you. Seriously? How about you take the s.h.i.+tter? You're the unwanted guest here. I'll even throw in a magazine, in case you get bored."

"We don't have time for this. We keep arguing, we're both going to be knocked unconscious in a matter of minutes."

Hardie didn't like the bathrooms in airplanes, let alone this.

Yet that's where Charlie Hardie found himself, on a s.p.a.ce toilet, during the most traumatic experience of his life. At some point in the descent he found himself incoherently thanking Christ that he was situated over a toilet because at one point the pressure was so intense it felt like his mashed internal organs were going to come launching out of his a.s.s. On top of that, the heat was way more intense than he had dreamed possible-as if he were lying on a sunny beach the day G.o.d decided to crank the thermostat from 102 up to Fahrenheit 451. Toward the end, when Hardie had convinced himself that he was really going to die this time, his bottom lip and nose bust and began to gush blood, splattering all over his face. Hardie would not be looking his best upon his return to his home planet, that was for sure.

And then came splashdown.

It was the exact opposite of gentle.

In theory they were supposed to have parachutes to break the fall, but Hardie didn't think they slowed down at all. Their descent was as fast and fierce and relentless as the worst car wreck you could ever experience. As if G.o.dzilla had loaded the vessel into a G.o.dzilla-sized shotgun, aimed it point-blank at the planet, and pulled the trigger. Everything hurt all at once-the burning, the straps cutting into his body, the insane pressure on every square inch of his body, inside and out-as the craft slammed into the surface of the Pacific Ocean.

Hardie couldn't see if his clone was experiencing the same set of miseries. He could only hope and pray that he was.

You?

Well...

You pa.s.s out fairly early in the descent-just as things start to heat up nicely.

And you stay out.

In your defense, you've been through quite a lot in the past twelve hours-being whipped into orbit and back, with a wrestling match and a fistfight and a stressful (and unfruitful) search, for good measure. Even the toughest of pilots go grayout at four Gs, and few can withstand five Gs. That was it. The craft must not have been designed to cancel out enough of the shock. You're not to blame.

Unfortunately, you're not conscious, either. Right at the moment you very much need to be conscious.

Somehow Hardie stayed awake the entire time. At the high point of the hurt he thought for sure that he was going be slammed into that not so gentle good night. Alas, he did not. That would be a break from the pain, at least.

Instead he was left with that deeply rattled feeling you have after a multicar pileup. Nothing seems quite real, yet your senses are taking in every detail, as if recording it for future nightmare purposes.

The craft was bobbing up and down. Hardie reached up, mildly surprised he still had hands with actual fingers instead of fleshy blobs at the ends of his wrists. He unstrapped himself from the toilet and dropped to the other side of the craft. He had no idea he was actually hanging upside down.

Ow.

Once he climbed to his feet and threw his arms out to balance himself, Hardie's earthbound bearings seemed to kick back in. Yes, he was inside a billion-dollar tin can, bopping along the surface of an ocean. Hopefully his clone was right and it was the Pacific. Then again, his clone lied a lot.

And look at him now. Strapped into the good seat and completely unconscious. Hardie made his way over to him. He was hanging from the straps like a puppet hanging inside a net. He felt for a pulse: beating and strong. Still alive.

"So," Hardie said. "What was that s.h.i.+t about reviving me? Or signaling for help?"

The double said nothing.

"What are you gonna do if the Cabal pirates show up to reclaim their little satellite, huh? What's that?

The double said nothing.

"Riiiiight, you're gonna do nothing at all, because you're pa.s.sed out like a freshman at his first kegger. d.i.c.khead."

Hardie thought about slapping him awake. Not just because it would probably make him feel really good. But also because it made sense. If they were indeed drifting on the open ocean they were going to need rescuing. He'd read a story once in an in-flight magazine about three boys who were cast adrift in a fis.h.i.+ng boat for something absurd like seventy days and ended up eating their own fingernails and chunks of their own scalp. That sounded like a special brand of h.e.l.l.

Then again, Hardie could always snack on his double. Would that be autocannibalism?

What the h.e.l.l is wrong with me, Hardie thought. The crash must have scrambled my brains for me to be thinking about this stuff. He needed to pry his way out of this tin can p.r.o.nto. After a few minutes of seasick searching, Hardie saw it: PULL TO RELEASE HATCH DOOR.

Easy enough, right?

Hardie reached up and pulled the handle. Nothing happened. He tried again. Maybe all of that time up in orbit had caused his biceps to wither away to nothing. Which would be amusing. Hardie imagined trying to twist his first beer cap in years and failing miserably. If that was the case, then what was he thinking? Did he really think he was going to bust out of this tin can and swim to sh.o.r.e and have beer like nothing happened?

He tried again, both hands now, giving it all of his might. Which, Hardie had to admit, may not have been much. This time, though, the handle yielded with a satisfying thunk.

And a microsecond later, the world exploded in front of his face.

11.

Don't do me no favors.

-Danny Glover, Lethal Weapon.

SEE, WHAT THE sign should have said, instead of PULL TO RELEASE HATCH.

was something along the lines of PULL TO SET OFF A BIG HATCH-BLOWING EXPLOSION.

THAT WILL KNOCK YOU ON YOUR a.s.s.

And if Hardie hadn't been blown back into the opposite side of the craft, he might have seen the truly majestic sight of the hatch door bursting from the frame and flipping a few times before landing in choppy blue ocean water.

But instead, all he felt was burning fury on his face and hands ... and then something heavy slamming into his spine. Which would be the opposite end of the s.p.a.cecraft.

Hardie came to his senses a few seconds-maybe minutes?-later. Sunlight and water poured in from above. The first blue sky he'd seen in ... Hardie didn't even know. The brightness and splendor of it all burned his eyes. Which paired nicely with his burning hands and face.

Where was he? No idea. The Other Him had said they'd be splas.h.i.+ng down off the coast of California, but the Other Him wasn't the most reliable of narrators. Didn't astronauts splash down in the Atlantic, too? Which would be great. Hardie was sick of California. He's spent the better part of the last decade trying to escape it. Please, G.o.d, please let me be just off Key West or something. A quick swim to sh.o.r.e, a nouris.h.i.+ng shot of rum, and then off to save my family.

Charlie Hardie's s.p.a.cecraft did not splash down anywhere near Florida.

When the water started to fill the s.p.a.cecraft in earnest, Hardie knew they were in serious trouble. Within a minute he was up to his waist in seawater, and that seemed to happen in the s.p.a.ce of a blink. Was this supposed to happen? Or had he screwed something up when he blasted the hatch?

Whatever. Hardie needed to get out of here.

As he crawled along the side of the vessel, salt water lapped at his hands and burned like crazy. Which was going to make swimming fun. And that's what he was facing-a long swim. Without a life preserver. Somewhat stupidly he wondered if there were flotation devices hidden somewhere in this craft, as if he were aboard a commercial airline. There were no life preservers. Hardie had been over every piece of this d.a.m.ned thing for nine months; he would have noticed if there had been big inflatable orange vests. There were no seat cus.h.i.+ons that could be used as a flotation device, unless by some miracle the toilet could float.

Worry about that later, Hardie thought. Get out now.

Then he remembered his buddy, the clone.

The cruel part of him wanted to shout, Every man for himself! And just split. But the human being inside him couldn't. The father and husband inside of him couldn't, either. He needed this guy if his family had any shot at survival. Even if his story about the NSA and Eve Bell and rescuing him was complete and utter bulls.h.i.+t, somebody had to be backing him. Sure as s.h.i.+t wasn't the Cabal, breaking into its own satellite. And any enemy of the Cabal's was a friend of Hardie's.

"Come on, pal, let's get you unhooked. No, really, it's no trouble at all. You just rest and relax and I'll take care of the whole thing."

You can't respond.

You're out. O-U-T. Out.

You don't sense Charlie Hardie unbuckle you from your harness, nor do you see the water rising at an alarming rate. You're not awake to see the panic in Hardie's face as he realizes the water is rising much, much quicker than he thought possible. You certainly don't feel it when Hardie accidentally bangs your skull on the side of the hatchway. Which is probably fortunate, because had you been awake it would have really, really hurt.

All you can do is be carried along.

Sometimes a much younger and more carefree Charlie Hardie would go swimming in someone else's pool (never his pool; his family couldn't afford a luxury like a pool, even those cheaper metal-and-vinyl above-ground pools). He'd play a game with himself: How long can I stay afloat? The rules were simple. He would pump his arms and legs to keep himself up in the middle of the pool without touching the bottom or sides. If he did, he'd lose. He'd imagine that he'd been abandoned in the middle of a vast ocean, and his life would be over the minute his arms and legs failed to move. The young Hardie never won the game, of course. Winning was impossible. Sooner or later his burning, tired limbs would give out, and he'd gently float down those few inches until his feet touched the vinyl pool bottom. Or someone would jump in next to him or throw a pool toy at his head.

Hardie never thought he'd actually be stuck in the middle of a vast ocean, with no land in sight, body aching and limbs already dangerously weak-and with his arm wrapped around a G.o.dd.a.m.ned clone of himself.

Knowing that the moment his free arm and two legs ran out of steam, he'd be a dead man.

He'd give anything to reach down with his toes and somehow feel a vinyl bottom.

Charlie Hardie had no idea how much time had pa.s.sed. It could have been anywhere from just a few minutes to a couple of hours. There were no landmarks, and there was no way to mark his progress. Or lack thereof. There was just water, water everyf.u.c.kingwhere, as a poet once said. The vastness of it was beginning to creep Hardie out. He tried not to think about it. But how could he not? He was a bug-not even a bug, a fleck of a bug part, struggling in this immense and ancient primordial force. Long before there was a Charlie Hardie, there was this ocean, and out of it sprang all life as we know it. Long after Charlie Hardie was gone, as well as the rest of life on earth, there would be this ocean. Charlie Hardie didn't matter at all. If he were to slip under the surface the ocean would not give a d.a.m.n.

Thoughts like these did not help Hardie's situation. He started to feel faint. He couldn't tell if his chest was pounding from sheer exhaustion or from the onset of a heart attack. Rational, sane worry gave way to trapped animal panic. This was not good. He shouldn't have left the vessel. At least he could have drowned in familiar surroundings, and somebody would maybe find his fish-cleaned skeleton someday thousands of feet below the surface ...

And then his weak, fatigued, oxygen-starved muscles finally gave out, and he slipped under.

12.

Hey, Rowlf-we're getting the old gang back together.

-Kermit the Frog, The Muppets.

THE CABAL NOTICED the problem with their s.p.a.cecraft immediately. You don't spend billions on a project only to forget about it.

But notification wasn't instantaneous.

The whole point of this manned satellite was to render it unreachable by traditional wireless means, keeping the prize within safe and secure. But of course you had to be able to track the thing. An ordinary citizen with a telescope, a pen, and a piece of paper could track it. Which is who they employed-an amateur yet highly talented satellite tracker who would do this for fun. They even paid him a modest salary. The tracker saw the anomaly and immediately phoned it in. That call was forwarded to Abrams's office. The tracker was told to continue tracing the satellite's errant path, which he did dutifully, right up until the moment it fell out of the sky.

Which p.i.s.sed Abrams off.

This entire operation was supposed to be a no-brainer, a simple way to contain two highly volatile elements far, far out of the hands of enemy forces during these challenging days.

Now this whole thing was going to become a highly annoying task, on top of the other annoying tasks she found herself facing every day. She could just feel it.

All of this was Doyle's fault-that stubborn savant c.o.c.ksucker. He was the gadget-and-gears freak, and Abrams had the nagging suspicion that it was going to end in disaster for them all.

If Abrams'd had her way, Charlie Hardie's lifeless body would have been fed through a wood chipper and used to fertilize at least a dozen different states. "Unkillable Chuck" my a.s.s-the man had caused too many problems as it was, and cost their movement untold billions. And Doyle wanted to throw another billion after him?

"You sure this isn't about revenge?"

She'd asked Doyle this as he was still recovering in a private hospital back east after his last encounter with Hardie. Doyle had been beaten senseless and hooked up to life support in the trunk of a car as Hardie drove down the Pacific Coast Highway. The only respite from the relentless nausea were stops so that Hardie could open the trunk, interrogate him, then beat him some more. Doyle, buddy, we're going to Hollywood.

"No," Doyle had said, clearly lying. "He's a resource. We don't squander resources, remember?"

"Uh-huh."

Doyle had sighed. "Fine. Perhaps there is a small, insignificant element of revenge. The man did leave me to die in the trunk of a car."

In the blazing sun of a long-term car lot at a California airport, no less.

But instead of destroying their enemies, which was more or less Cabal m.o. going back decades, Doyle had talked Abrams into sparing Hardie's life temporarily, squeezing some use out of him. Doyle had been talking about his fantasy of an "unbreakable vault" for many years now, to the point where Abrams realized she probably signed off on the venture just so he'd shut up about it already. For Doyle, the idea of an "unkillable" man inside his "unbreakable vault" became an obsession, an idee fixe, and it had finally come to fruition.

Now, apparently, it had blown up in their faces. There wasn't much Abrams could do about it except follow it through to its logical conclusion.

Originally there had been three ruling partners of their organization: Gedney, Doyle, and Abrams herself. Charlie Hardie had done the unthinkable and killed Gedney, though even Abrams had to admit that the man had it coming. You don't put someone as volatile as Charlie Hardie inside a secret prison and expect him to languish there forever. Wood chipper, people. Wood chipper. Abrams a.s.sumed her partners thought she was joking about the wood chipper, but they didn't realize it had been a fetish of hers since that infamous Coen brothers movie. You don't know bliss until you've walked barefoot through the freshly pulped remains of another human being. Especially if you've had a conversation with them not five minutes before.

Gedney's way: hadn't worked.

Doyle's way: failing miserably. The Cabal was hurting and was forced to hide underground while their enemies picked away at their various fronts and operations around the globe.

Which left Abrams's way.

"I'll take care of it," she said to Doyle on the phone now. Poor Doyle, even a year later, was still going through rigorous rehabilitation sessions at a private facility on the East Coast.

"This isn't my fault," he said. "The craft was impenetrable. All systems in place. Hardie had no way of knowing how to knock the craft out of its...o...b..t, and there was no way anyone could have transmitted that information to him. It's a locked room mystery. An inside job!"