spoke up again wasn’t the same one. This time it was a man . . . an annoyingly upbeat man. “Wow, when you put it that way, Stanley, you’ve really had quite the adventure today.”
“You . . .” He stared in disbelief at his phone, but sure enough, he had dialed 911. “How did you reroute my call? No. How are you alive?”
“Both of those are excellent questions. But first, I just want to give you my compliments. Most people, when I have to do something painful or scary or fatal to them, they don’t react nearly as decisively as you do. They hesitate. But you acted. The thing with the car? Bravo, Stanley. You are way tougher than you look. Let’s face it. You are kind of a badass.”
Stanley didn’t get compliments very often and was momentarily taken aback. “Uh . . . thanks?”
“I still need to shoot you in the heart though.”
“Oh.”
“But I want you to know it’s nothing personal. You seem like a really nice guy. After meeting you I am kind of surprised you have so few friends and such a negative and pessimistic outlook about quite literally every topic.”
“How do you know that?”
“I checked your Facebook feed. But anyway, to answer your previous questions, the communications devices of this time are rather simplistic and easy to manipulate if you have a phased quantum field generator. And next, I am alive because I can’t really die. Well, I could, and I have before, but not here, or now. It’s really complicated. Anyway, would you mind pulling over so I can catch up with you?”
“No!” Stanley reflexively mashed the red button on the screen to hang up. But nothing happened. The call wouldn’t disconnect. His unrelenting assassin kept on talking.
“If you don’t mind my advice—not that I don’t think you’re doing a terrific job on your own—but you shouldn’t drive distracted. You might get in another accident. I’m going to put myself on speaker.” And sure enough, somehow, now he was on speakerphone. “That’s better. This way you can keep both hands on the wheel for safety.”
Since he was an emotional wreck and trying not to plow into any other cars while violating the hell out of the speed limit and a whole bunch of traffic laws, that was actually helpful. Stanley almost reflexively thanked him, but that seemed inappropriate, so instead he shouted, “Who are you?”
“Oh, sorry. Normally I don’t have a chance to introduce myself. I’m Chris.”
Chris? That wasn’t a very dramatic psycho killer name at all. “Why won’t you just leave me alone, Chris?”
“This is my job.”
“Going around shooting people?” Stanley was flabbergasted. Why would someone hire a hit man for him?
“It’s not all mean. Sometimes, I get ordered to do nice things for them instead. But if I’m being honest, there is a lot of shooting. Stabbing too. And strangulation, sabotage, arson, spreading diseases, poison, that sort of thing. But it’s been a really long time since I’ve had to use a projectile weapon. I’m pretty embarrassed about forgetting to put one of the ammunition thingies into the shooter tube.”
“You are the worst hit man ever!”
“I’m not a . . . hit? Man? What is that? A man who goes around hitting people? That sounds barbaric.”
Stanley was so very confused. “What do you normally shoot people with, then?”
“A graviton lance, obviously . . . Wait. Do you guys have those yet?”
Stanley tossed his cell phone out the window.
Except now Chris addressed him from the car’s radio. “That was really clever. You probably realized that I might be tracking you through your phone. Good job, Stanley!”
That hadn’t been what he’d been thinking at all, but it wasn’t like he received positive affirmation very often. He worked in IT. “Yeah! You can’t catch me that easy, Chris.”
As Stanley searched for the off knob on the radio, he realized he had to think of something and fast. Not only was Chris apparently immortal, he also had access to some really high-tech gadgets. How did one escape someone so powerful and obnoxiously enthusiastic?