St. Nick Fury/It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year
From Unofficial Handbook of the Virtue Universe
This story was written by Ascendant in December of 2009, about his character St. Nick Fury.
It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year
0630 GMT The Workshop
It's nearing the end of the year, the fading hours of the first decade of a new millennium.
I'm ready for it. As ready as any man can be.
I don't know how many years longer I can keep this up; I feel like I've been at it for centuries already, and at times, when the howling arctic wind catches me in just the right way, the man-made cracks in my bones ache like hell. I don't know how many years I can keep this up, but I know, at least, how long I will.
As long as I possibly can.
I have other duties, other responsibilities. This isn't my job, it's a reward they give me for doing my job. I know this. I understand it, but this moment is never far from my mind the rest of the year. When I'm discussing the finer points of satellite intelligence interpretation down in SIGNIT in September, or when I'm spending July arguing for more funding from a U.N. that would rather be throwing the money at olive branches, or even when I'm coaching the best and brightest of the Academy's graduation class on how to survive their first wet op in February, I'm thinking about today.
Yes, I think about it even as soon as February.
Especially February, because the previous year's work is still fresh in my mind.
It's crazy-- at least, charitably speaking, it's unhealthy-- how much I look forward to this time of the year. I can't help it, though. I'm like a kid at--
The comlink buzzes, as it has every year since I agreed to take this job. It's the few things I have to a tradition these days, and who am I to argue with tradition, especially during this time of year?
“Nick,” the voice says on the other end of the line, “You're a go.”
In all years I've been getting The Call, I still don't have a name to go with the voice on the other end of the line; even my considerable resources can't penetrate that particular veil of secrecy, but I know he speaks for the U.N. council that secretly oversees the Supreme Legal, Espionage and Intelligence Global Headquarters. He doesn't say it out loud (and I don't blame him; even over an Extreme Low Frequency transmitter, there's too much risk the words would be recorded somewhere to come back and haunt him), but I can hear even through the scrambler that he's wishing me good luck.
He knows, as well as I do, that this is my reward, not my job.
And, he knows, as well as I do, that this is what my job should be.
The Weather Outside is Frightful
0700 GMT The Workshop
“Good morning, Nick,” Virginia says as I enter the Workshop's Ops Center. She's beautiful as always, red hair pulled back in a pony tail, sharp green eyes teaming with knowledge, attitude, and just a hint of mirth.
Steady, old man, I caution myself, then recite to myself the oft-practiced litany of reasons Virginia and I will not--- can not--- ever be more than co-workers.
Still, I give her the smile that I do only for her. It makes my eyes twinkle and my dimples look merry (most of all, though, it causes the patch over my left eye to itch like the devil), but I do it because she needs to see that I still can smile. She needs to know that despite my yearly odyssey, I haven't checked out entirely. I don't know why, but for some reason, it's vital that she, at least, continues to believe in me. Maybe because I need her trust in me to be validated. Maybe because I need to show her that The Job doesn't have to rob you of your soul.
“What have we got this morning?” I ask, as casually as if it was any other day of the year.
“Glad you asked,” Virginia says, then ushers me into the Op Center proper.
Despite the years I've spent on the Job, Ops never fails to impress me. The size of a good sized movie theater, Ops is technological wonderland that makes NASA's Mission Control look like Frankenstein's lab. In addition to billboard-sized video displays on every wall, dozens of sophisticated holodisplays are steadily streaming the latest satellite intel or computer projections against all manner of enemies across the globe, from a formative weather pattern in the Gulf of Mexico to a group of militants hiding behind a rock near the Pakistan/Afghanistan boarder, and every manner of threat in between.
The newest iteration of S.L.E.I.G.H. satellite imaging package has a high enough resolution to measure a target's respiratory speed from orbit; using them, I can tell what a target is sleeping. Or know when they're awake.
“What's it looking like out there, Rudy?”
The Workshop's resident meteorologist, caught unaware, nodded a brief red-faced hello before pointing at the holographic display of the Earth.
“Looks like you're in for some pretty interesting weather, Saint.”
I bristle for a moment; then remind myself that all Rudy probably knows is that I used to be called the Saint because I once defended an orphanage in Medellín from the Cartel. I had been ordered out but refused to leave; proof of U.S. military personnel on site was definitely not part of the mission profile. The kids in the orphanage all lived. The Cartel's goons, not so much. The local goodwill I gained us from becoming an instant urban legend helped undermine Escobar, and more importantly, saved me from court martial.
But that was a lifetime ago.
I haven't been a Saint in years.
I let it pass in less than the space of an eyeblink; there will be time enough to explain the difference between Idealism and Obtainable Goals to Rudy later. I've got bigger things to attend to right now.
If Rudy noticed the pause, he covers it well. “We're tracking several serious weather patterns-- nothing unusual for this time of year, mind you, but it'll make atmo piloting tricky in a few places. In particular, you'll encounter merging supercells over the Eastern United States, and there are a few emergent patterns in the Eurasian continent I'd like to keep a closer eye on. For the most part, though, I think I can guide you through them.”
I nod in agreement. Tricky, yes, impossible, no. Besides, this isn't my first night out.
“Hermey, what about support?”
The cherubic blond air traffic controller looked up from his holographic radar projection, “Donner and Blitzen are fueled and ready on the pads, and should be suborbital about the time you hit the 90 Lat. They'll be tracking your ELFmitter all night, should you need 'em.”
I nod again. The two hypersonic strike fighters are brand new this year, but I'd always had something similar following me. I haven't ever needed active air support, but it's good to know I can bring the Thunder and Lightning on demand, if need be.
“Virginia,” I say, and, just like that, she's somehow by my side.
“Sir?”
It's the only time during the year she ever calls me sir. I used to think it was because she respected the man she was addressing. Over the past few years, however, I've come to understand that it's her way of calling me back to the man I was. Her way of saying, “Are you sure you want to do this?”
I hold the datacube in my palm. She takes it, gingerly, understanding what it is, what it represents. She's done it often enough now that this has become our own annual tradition.
“I'll need everything you can give me on the people on this List,” I hear myself say. It's the same script every year. The people on the List are worst people alive, people who do horrible, unspeakable things for money, or power, or, even, just for fun. They're also people who, for whatever reason, enjoy some sort of protection from the justice they deserve, a protection that won't save them tonight. It seems like each year, the list is longer.
I guess it's lucky for me that tonight is one of the longest nights of the year.
Of the twelve on the list, only two are leftovers from last year. An impressive turn over, but still also, a challenge to do better this year. Next year, I plan to have nothing but newcomers.
She takes the cube, nods, starts to walk away. She makes it three steps before she pauses, deviating from our tradition.
“I heard once that you used to keep two Lists,” she says, not looking back. Perhaps, not daring to.
I close my remaining eye and think back to then. There was a time when I fought my battles standing up, when I only took out those who were fighting back. But somewhere along the line, the man they used to call the Saint realized that who I was and who I am wouldn't recognize each other if they passed on the street. The man I was would wage a war from an orphanage in Columbia and take on the worst the cartels had to offer. The man I am realizes it's much easier to kill them in their sleep the night before.
“The Nice can look out for themselves tonight,” I reply.
Coming To Town
North Atlantic Ocean 8:24 GMT
The Lockheart X-52 is a vehicle that isn't slated to be “invented” for another 10 years; when that happens, it'll be a revolutionary way to invisibly deliver small groups of troops (read: spies) virtually anywhere in the world. The boys in TacSim and PsychOps are still trying to figure out how the disclosure that we can land troops virtually undetected anywhere in the world will play out against the paranoias of our collective enemies.
There are currently 3 copies of the as-yet-to-officially-exist aircraft: one at the Air Force's 37th Tactical Fighter Wing, where they try to figure if it's worth the cost Lockheart is asking, one at Lockheart's Mojave testing facility, where they try to figure out how to make it worth the cost, and the one I'm currently flying, which, frankly, is the only one actually earning its pay.
They call it the Sled because it bears an uncanny resemblance to an Olympic bobsled-- an elongated torpedo shape with a recessed cockpit well towards the rear of the craft. It has room for four, if necessary, but tonight I'm carrying enough ordinance with me to take up the other three seats.
It's built out of a composite carbon fiber that we won't "officially" discover for another 6 years; a material that keeps the hull light enough to give it an insane power to weight ratio, strong enough to handle the stresses of double digit G maneuvers, and grants it a radar signature comparable to a ping-pong ball. The skin is doped with the same long-chain polymer miracle that coats my Stealthsuit, capable of real-time adaptive camouflage, a trick that involves receiving light from one side of an object and sending it more-or-less seamlessly to a mapped display node on the other side. It's a poor man's invisibility, but an effective one none the less. As an additional plus, it's thick enough on the hull to protect the the heat the Sled builds up at Mach 4.
Here above the Atlantic, the VTOL lifters have been disengaged, as well as the Pulse Detonation engines that power the tiny craft to airspeeds exceeding Mach 1. Now, it's just the angry roar of a hungry, underslung scramjet hurtling it through the atmosphere. Right now, the Sled is a vehicle that doesn't fly so much as pummels its way through the air in a convincing impersonation of flying.
I'm not flying a plane so much as I'm riding a bullet.
Rudy's path through the towering thunderheads of his merging supercells works well enough; the Sled takes a battering from the winds, but the three redundant flight computers tweak the Sled's stubby flight planes subtly thousands of times a second, keeping the ride as something dangerously approaching smooth. The gut reaction when the Sled hits a bad patch of weather is to try to fly it myself, but that's a fool's bet. I'm a good pilot, damned good, in fact, but the Sled's third generation bio-computers are literally born to fly, and built to service this form only. I force myself to ignore the increasing bad weather outside and focus on my first target. His details spill across my HUD.
Derrick Partridge. Age 48. 173.6 cm. 81.4 kg. Wife (third), Debbie, age 23. Kids: Cody, age 16, and Kendra, age 14, both from a former marriage. Derrick is CEO of Cerberus Systems, a multinational weapons corporation that, four years ago, moved most of its manufacturing operations out of the US and into countries that turned a blind eye to child labor. The kids in Cerberus factories spend 20 hours a day building the weapons and ammunition that are often used to kill or enslave their fellow children in a half dozen different wars across the world that simply aren't profitable enough to earn global intervention.
Cerberus supplies weapons and ammunition to all sides of the conflict. They work on credit, too, and are more than happy to accept land as payment. This land goes towards building Cerberus factories, the shantytowns full of refugees fleeing the conflicts that supply workers to them, and all manner of infrastructure scams that supply food, water, power, and vices to them. Cerberus gets a cut of it all, a parasite that grows inside of an organism even as it kills them on multiple fronts.
To be fair, Derrick wasn't the person who started Cerberus on a path that put weapons in the hands of kids, that encouraged genocide in a dozen countries, or chained children to machines to work on his company's behalf even as his own children were attending the finest private academies in the world. The person who actually did that was the late Lawrence McCall, former CEO of Cerberus. He died of a gunshot wound between his eyes, in his bed a year ago tonight. The assailant is unknown to the world's law enforcement agencies in general, and politely ignored by everyone else with Level Theta or higher clearance.
No, Derrick isn't directly responsible for any of Cerberus' sins, but in the year he's been in charge since McCall died, he hasn't done anything to stop them, either.
There's a saying about those who don't learn from history, one that Derrick has already proven, one about to be demonstrated, in his case, to it's ultimate conclusion.
I key the Sled's course in on Virginia's last spotted location of Partridge, and now I'm riding a bullet seeking a final target somewhere in New York's Long Island. The air ahead is thankfully free of traffic; it seems I'm the only one dumb enough to fly in this weather. I'm not looking forward to ending Derrick's life, but he's had a full year to make good, and didn't.
I honestly hope that Derrick's successor takes the hint, and I don't have make a similar visit a year from tonight.
