Alien Research

CHAPTER 26

THE JET AND TANK EXPLODED. Which was impressive. Thanked God that we hadn’t armed the nuclear warheads. No mushroom cloud was good.

Debris, however, was not good.

The last time something big had exploded nearby, I’d had Jamie’s stroller with me and Mr. Joel Oliver had activated the laser shield button. Come to think of it, that wasn’t the last time, merely a time.

But whatever time it had or hadn’t been, for that and all the others we’d had either A-C laser shielding or ACE helping protect us. We had neither now. And while A-Cs and Amazons healed quickly, which was why they’d covered all the humans, it’s hard to recover from flaming pieces of jet hitting you, no matter where you’re from.

The person I was lying on shoved up on her hands, hard. Christopher and I tumbled off, as she got to her knees and put her hands out. A wall of sand and dirt, easily a hundred feet high, went up between us and the debris. Chick had some serious skills.

The wall of dirt fell over, toward the explosion. I’m sure there’s a more technical term for it, but visually it truly fell, just like a wall can, straight over.

We all stood up. Christopher and I grabbed hold of our prisoner, just in case. “How did you know the tank was aimed for the jet?” I asked.

“You’d gotten yourself lost in the sandstorm. I was looking for you.”

“Aww, that’s sweet. Thanks.”

The air near us shimmered and Jeff, then Chuckie, then Gower appeared. “Are you all alright?” Jeff asked, worry plain. “There were issues with the gate and Chuck wouldn’t let me run here.”

Took this to mean Chuckie had intelligently used his Vulcan Nerve Pinch move on Jeff, because I doubted that Jeff would have listened to reason when he knew we were in danger.

“Why are you dressed like . . . that?” Gower asked.

“He means like mummies,” Chuckie added, in case we weren’t clear that we all looked like bizarre fashion victims.

“We had to run through a huge sandstorm and we wanted to keep our eyes and more tender organs. Yes, we’re fine, thanks for actually asking, first in no thanks to and then because of her.” I indicated our prisoner, and pulled her headgear off. Was indeed a chick. Wanted to interrogate her, but there was a more pressing question.

“Before Missus Chief goes on or asks, allow me,” Buchanan said. “Why are you here, Pontifex Gower?” Glad to see the question had been pressing for Buchanan, too. “You’re undoubtedly a target, and were told to stay in the Embassy.”

“I may be,” Gower said, jaw set. “But my brother and sisters are here and I’m not going to hide in the Embassy when they need me. And I was one of the few who could hold out against the mind control. You need me, and my sisters and brother need me.”

“Speaking of targets, Sol, what are you doing here?” Jeff asked.

“Long story,” Dad said cheerfully. “I’m happy to be along for the ride.”

“Someone should be,” Christopher muttered.

“You know, I’m wondering if all of this, and them having Michael, Mimi, and Abby in particular, is simply to get Paul here.”

“Maybe, but whatever their goal, they have my wife, every adult hybrid other than the Pontifex, most of Alpha Team, all of Airborne, and most of Centaurion Division Security, along with all of Centaurion Division’s information, and who knows how many other hostages.”

“Succinctly put, Secret Agent Man. Any ideas?”

“What’s our weapons situation?”

Buchanan and White shared our small but mighty arsenal. Adriana’s backpack was nice and full of useful things as well. “That’s all you brought?” Gower asked when they were done. He sounded more than a little shocked and peeved.

“We brought plenty more.”

Jeff, Chuckie, and Gower looked around. “I don’t see them,” Gower said finally. “Are they cloaked?”

“Ah, no. They’re still in our downed plane. I think, anyway. I mean, realistically, they’ve blown up. Just like the plane. And the tank.”

The three of them stared at me.

“Blown up?” Jeff asked finally.

“Why?” Gower added.

“Is there anything left of the plane to salvage?” Chuckie asked. “Or the tank?”

“I mentioned a sandstorm, right? The person Christopher and I are hanging onto used a sand tornado and dirt clods, along with tank artillery, to shoot us down. Then she rammed her tank into our plane. Then she dumped dirt on all of that to prevent the explosion from killing us. I guess anyway. Anything to add to that?” I asked her.

Either she was a shapeshifter, an imageer with image overlay talent, or she wasn’t a full-blooded A-C, because while she was okay to look at, she wasn’t Dazzler gorgeous by a long shot.

She was taller than me by a few inches, with long, light brown hair and average features. Her build was slender—not that you could tell since she was still in what now kind of looked like a Jedi robe, but having just fought with her, I could confirm what she’d felt like.

Her one exceptional feature was her eyes—they were bright green. They were also glaring daggers at me. She didn’t reply.

“Okey dokey. Well, why we went down is because it’s hard as hell to fly a Big Ugly Flying Fugly in the same way you handle a super-maneuverable jet. However, while there was damage, the BUFF wasn’t totally destroyed—there was plenty of it left, along with all of its contents, until our ‘friend’ here blew it up. And we left most of the weapons there because Jeff said the person creating the dust storm wasn’t after the plane or its contents and we were in a hurry.”

“Kitty did a masterful job of keeping us all alive and landing safely,” Dad said, oozing parental pride and support. Considered the benefits of always having Dad along for the ride. Figured they couldn’t outweigh the risks of him being in danger, let alone what Mom would do if he got hurt while along for said rides. Chose to bask in the glow of someone thinking I’d done a good job for as long as it lasted.

“Kitty’s crash landing took a lot out of us,” Christopher added.

Basking glow lasted all of two seconds. Potentially a new world record.

“You were a Commander for over a decade,” Chuckie pointed out. “I’d kind of expected you to be, I don’t know, helping Kitty in some way.”

“Everyone’s a critic. You want to harangue someone? I give you Sand Chick.”

Chuckie looked at our prisoner. “Good point. Who are you and what’s your role in all that’s going on?”

“We’d like your full name,” I added. “And then we’d like to know if you ever knew your father.”

“Or mother,” Chuckie added.

“Right, or mother.”

“You’re all going to die.” She had an accent. It was vaguely familiar, but I couldn’t place it.

“What part of the Middle East are you from?” Chuckie asked. Unsurprisingly, he could place it. Realized it sounded familiar because I hung out with the Bahraini and Israeli Diplomatic Missions quite a lot these days.

She didn’t answer.

Gave her a little shake. “Your name or your country of origin. Pick one, or better both, and share the information we want. Now.”

She remained silent, with a look of pride. Clearly she’d been told that her holding out on us was of paramount importance for The Cause.

Buchanan selected a gun from our recently dissed but still darned well good enough for government work arsenal, cocked it, and casually aimed for her head. “She’s the nice one. I’m the hired, trained, amoral killer, and I’m hired by someone who will be just fine if I say I chose to kill you because you represented a threat. Keep that in mind for the rest of your time with us, however brief a time that might be.”

“Mahin Sherazi,” she replied quickly, as I noted Adriana giving Buchanan a look of impressed admiration. Olga would undoubtedly be getting a fun earful when we all got home.

“That’s a beautiful name,” Dad said, falling naturally into the Good Cop role. “It means related to the moon, right?” She nodded. “And your last name means your family comes from city of Sheraz, located in southwest Iran, correct?” She nodded again. “So, are you Iranian?”

“Yes.” She said this like she was admitting something as opposed to confirming what Dad and Chuckie had already figured out.

“Great, we get it, death to America and all that jazz. Here’s the thing . . . despite the burka you don’t look Middle Eastern. You sound it, but you don’t look it. At all. And yes, sure, I’ve seen the picture of the beautiful Afghan girl on the cover of National Geographic and all that. You’re not her. So I’m just going to go out on a limb and say that your mother wasn’t actually Iranian.”

“I don’t care about death to America. I care about death to my father’s killers.”

It so figured. “Your father, the one who impregnated your mother, was Ronald Yates?” She nodded. We’d all assumed as much, but it was nice to be sure.

“Kitty’s right, her mother was an American reporter for one of the many divisions of YatesCorp.” Chuckie was looking at his phone. “She covered some stories in the Middle East, met an Iranian man, fell in love, got married, had a child. Only one. At least, only one that was acknowledged. There could be more, of course.”

“How’d you find all that?”

“They may have taken us down, but they didn’t affect the cellular network and Google lives on.”

“Ah, good to know. So, Mahin, when did your mother tell you who your father really was? Or did you discover it when your half brother showed up to recruit you into the great cause or whatever?” She’d identified using the name of the man who’d undoubtedly raised her, so that could mean she was new to the whole Al Dejahl Cause.

“I have always known.”

“Your mother told you that the man whose name you have wasn’t your real father?” Chuckie didn’t sound like he bought this one. I didn’t, either.

Buchanan smiled. It was quite a nasty smile. I wasn’t used to seeing him pull this one out, but good to know he had it handy. “Missus Chief, you and the other Reappointed Commander step away. Don’t want to get you two all blood-splattered.”

“Fine,” Mahin snapped. “I’ve always known I was different. Other children played in the dirt. I made the dirt play with me.”

Missed ACE a lot right now. ACE had never mentioned other hybrid children, but that probably only meant that the information fell under the “too much interference” heading. Wished it had occurred to me to ask about them before right now.

“Did you ever hear a voice in your head, telling you how to control your power?”

“Yes. My father watched over me.”

“That wasn’t your father.” The words slipped out before I could stop them. There was nothing wrong with this particular sentence, other than the fact that Gower couldn’t pull ACE up to share the truth.

Mahin gave me yet another dirty look. She had a variety of them. The Yates Gene certainly had its privileges. Glaring was Christopher’s Olympic Event; dirty looks were clearly what Mahin had focused on in her training. “As if you would know.”

Chose to let discretion be the better part of keeping my mouth shut and hoped no one else would decide we needed to bring Mahin up on the ACE situation. “Whatever. Are your mother and father good with your being with the Al Dejahl terrorist organization? I mean the man who raised you, not your sperm donor.”

“My parents are dead,” Mahin said, voice tight. “However, they always encouraged me to do what I felt was right.”

“And you took that to mean buddying up to terrorists was the way to go? Interesting choice. So, when did you join up with Ronaldo Al Dejahl? Before or after your parents died?”

She didn’t reply.

Chuckie sighed. “We can force you to tell us, you know. Why make it difficult on yourself?”

“I will not betray my family.”

“Your parents are dead, so you can’t actually betray them, other than to be someone they wouldn’t be proud of. Don’t know what their views were, so I have no idea if you’re winning Daughter of the Year or not. And, as Chuckie said, we don’t see a record of any siblings.”

“I am an only child,” she admitted. “My parents didn’t have other children and not acknowledge them.”

“Good to know. But here’s the thing.” Pointed to White. “He’s your family, too. As close to you as Ronaldo is. So are they.” Pointed to Christopher, Jeff, and Gower. “They’re all related to each other and to Yates. More of your relatives are in the Science Center.”

Mahin’s eyes flicked away from me, then back. It was over in a flash, but I’d spent the last three-plus years with people who really couldn’t lie well. Everyone had tells, and I was fairly sure I’d just seen one of hers.

“Chuckie, Malcolm, Adriana, are you all thinking what I’m thinking?” Figured it was a safe bet they’d seen the same as I had. They were all trained or being trained to look for tells from those in their custody or similar, after all.

“Absolutely,” Adriana said.

“Yep,” Buchanan concurred.

“Yes,” Chuckie said, making it a full hand. “I’d like a good way to make the determination, though. Because it could be a fake.”

“Something’s fake, I’ll give you that.”

“Determine what?” Gower asked. “What’s fake?”

“This situation is fake, Paul. And what we need to do is determine where everybody we’re trying to rescue actually is.”