Chapter 2: I'll Just Shoot Him

The set of photos I ended up destroying were a lucky shot. I followed Terry for two months and the entire time, he only slipped up once. It wasn't even his fault, he was cutting vegetables in the shared kitchen when someone distracted him. The knife connected with his fingers and-

"Well, now it's just a memory."

I toss the ruined photos into the garbage can in my room and continue to think ouy loud.

"Now he knows he's being watched. I'm never gonna get another lucky shot. Even if I wanted one, I'll be reported if he catches me watching him."

As I try to think of what I can do next, without realizing it, I start to click my tongue and tap my finger faster and faster, then continue talking to myself but now in a low tone.

"Someone who's eluded detection for years, from countless people. I don't know how long he's been like this, but it must have taken time for him to get good at hiding it. Yet, even then he was never caught? How? Is he just that good? Even then, no matter how good he is at hiding, he's still different from everyone else. And by being different, he lacks something we have. I just have to expose that. Something that he doesn't have."

My finger slams down as the answer finally comes to me.

"Medical records."

It took me some time to come up with a plan, but sitting here in the third doctor's office of the day, I just know I'm on the right track.

At first, I thought I would start with the most popular doctor in the town. I realized though, that someone trying to blend in and hide would want a doctor who wasn't paying attention, or could be paid to look the other way.

I followed the line of logic; the doctors with the worst review scores are desperate for money and will be more willing to loosen their morals in order to pay the bills.

This doctor is the third lowest in reviews, and thankfully takes forever to even see me. Knowing I have time in abundance, I make my way over to the doctor's computer sitting on his desk and plug in a flash drive. I didn't really care for the technical details from the guy who sold it to me on campus, but basically it just tries a bunch of variations of common passwords until it guesses the correct password. It's not guaranteed to work, but if the computer security standards are low, I'll get better luck. Luckily, a doctor who's desperate enough to take a bribe isn't gonna put much time or money into computer security.

After a few thousand failed attempts, I'm logged in and looking at the desktop. Of course there's just a file right on the desktop for all the patient records. And there it is; "Terri Pierce".

"Let's see. Very minimal records. Just a single check up form for each year."

The files only went back to 2016, but I felt that would be enough for what I wanted.

I didn't understand any of the medical wording, but I got enough of an idea from the parts that were written in normal people speak.

"2016 check up. Everything normal. Not a single note or comment."

"2017, same thing."

"2018, sam- Wait, these are literally the same."

They were all the same. 2016 to 2023, every check up had the exact same numbers for everything. Except, 2020. 2020, the first two pages are as expected, but page three has a typo in the year where it says "2019". Is it just a typo, or is it a leftover from these reports being copied and pasted over and over again?

There was another thing I noticed as well. There are no vaccine records. It's possible he hasn't had any vaccines for a while, but no, 2019 or 2020, he would have had to have the covid vaccine; I don't even think you can go to our college without having had a covid vaccine at some point.

"It's all a façade. Just made up to look like any normal person who has to get checkups every year. But, since it's all fake, he never realized something so simple. He doesn't need to take vaccines."

Its not a silver bullet, but it's definitely something.

"Invulnerable. Indestructible. It all makes sense. Just like I saw. The blade didn't cut his fingers. He grabbed them as if in pain, but there was no blood or cuts. He doesn't take actual physicals because he can't get sick or injured. He can't get vaccines because the needle can't pierce his skin. Hell, he's probably affected by viruses."

"But it's not enough. This isn't the same as the photo, it's all deflectable."

"But, if I just stab him or something, he can't deny that."

"No. Even though I don't want to consider it, if I am wrong, I would end up injuring or even killing him. I can't take that risk."

I continue this debate with myself for a bit before finally settling on a perfect solution.

"I'll just shoot him!"