Alien Research

CHAPTER 79

MY PHONE BEEPED. I was snuggled on top of Jeff, my head pillowed on his chest, after several more rounds of fabulous sex. Much as a part of me just wanted to stay like this and pretend nothing else in the world mattered, I knew duty was calling. Or, in this case, texting.

Sat up and stretched. Jeff gave me a lazy, satisfied smile. “Well, I feel ready to face the night.”

“Mmm, me too.”

After a few more long, lingering kisses, we got our clothes buttoned back up and such, then I checked my phone. Sure enough, it was a text from Mom saying she wanted to get people pulled together to go do prisoner interrogation.

Jeff took me upstairs so he could say good night to Jamie and Dad. This was fine with me—my team was going to be leaving from here anyway.

“Who’s going over with you?” Dad asked.

“Me, Christopher, James, Chuck, Kevin, the flyboys. Apparently Angela wants them along for extra muscle. Brian’s going, too.”

“That’s a lot of people,” Dad said, making me wonder if Mom had filled him in on what we were doing or not. Remembered my father’s ability to lie was, for the most part, not much better than the A-C’s ability, and figured she hadn’t.

“Mom wants to do the old Impressive Show of Force thing, and I think Bri’s along to bring the pathos if it looks like it might work.”

“I have a simple rule,” Jeff said. “I don’t argue with my mother-in-law unless I think it’s a true life-or-death situation.”

“It’s always nice to know my daughter married a smart man.”

Jeff grinned, hugged Dad, kissed and cuddled Jamie, then really kissed me. “You be good, baby,” he murmured. “I’ll be home as soon as possible.”

“Good.”

There was a knock at our door. We opened it to find Christopher and Amy there. “You ready?” Christopher asked Jeff.

“Yep. See you girls later.” They zipped off.

Amy came in and shut the door. She picked up Jamie and chatted with Dad while we waited. Sure enough, about five minutes later Mom sent me a text. The menfolk were off-site and Chuckie had given the emotional blockers or enhancers to Serene.

Mom reminded me that they were going to a place where their cell phones wouldn’t work, but she insinuated that Buchanan would be able to reach her if need be. Hoped both that she was right and that we wouldn’t need to reach her.

“Okay, let’s call the rest of the team,” I said to Amy.

“I’ll go get the blueprints.” She handed Jamie to me and trotted out.

“Do I want to know?” Dad asked.

“You up for babysitting more than Jamie? And having the kids do a sleepover in the playroom?”

“Sure, kitten. As long as you tell me what’s going on.”

“I’ll tell you once the other kids are here.” Hopefully having her friends over would distract Jamie enough that she wouldn’t be aware of what I and the others were doing.

Dad looked at Jamie then back at me. “That’s fine.”

Gave Dad a peck on the cheek, then trotted into my bedroom to get changed. Black pants, a long-sleeved black T-shirt that had Aerosmith’s logo in a slightly different shade of black, comfortable black boots that looked like they were for hiking and other outdoor sports, and a black bandana were waiting for me. Clearly Algar planned ahead, or else he did his own silk-screening, because the T-shirt wasn’t one that I owned. Well, I owned it now, but I hadn’t purchased it.

“Like the shirt, thank you. And I hope this means you approve of what we’re doing.” I started to get undressed but stopped. Looked around and checked carefully—if Algar was watching, he wasn’t being obvious about it. Good.

Finished getting changed—despite having never seen these boots before and their looking brand-new, they were already broken-in and comfortable. “You do great work, I have to admit. Boots are super, thanks. And I note they have the quiet yet rugged soles, so thanks for thinking ahead.”

Dumped my other clothes into the hamper. “I’d ask you why you let Gladys die, but I already know your answer. And while I still hate it, having heard your speech from my uncle, I get it. I still think it sucks, mind you, but I get it.”

Took a deep breath and let it out. “I just hope you feel bad that she’s gone, that’s all. Well, not all, but all I can say right now.” Wanted to thank him for helping, as much as he had, without making it so clear that I knew that he’d stop helping. Cleared my throat. “Oh, and thanks for the support. Clean clothes matter.”

Contemplated another thing that needed to be handled. The Poofs and Peregrines had been planning their own raids during Michael’s funeral. “Harlie, Poofikins, Bruno,” I said in a low voice. They appeared. “Kitty’s going to go into Gaultier tonight. I don’t want my Poofs or Peregrines on this mission.”

Harlie and Poofikins mewed their disapproval, while Bruno gave me a betrayed look.

“Kitty wants her Poofies and Peregrines safe. You’ll be our backup plan, okay? Kitty will call for you if she needs you.” Hey, Mom had wanted me to have a backup plan, and for all I knew we’d have a better shot of reaching the animals.

They grumbled a bit, but finally agreed to stay at home and on call. Gave them pets and pats and they disappeared.

Made sure my new Glock was in my purse, then trotted out as the rest of the girls, and kids, arrived. We were all dressed similarly, though each girl had the logo of her band of choice, in black, just like I did.

We all got a raised eyebrow from Dad, but he didn’t say anything until Serene had the kids in the playroom, all watching 101 Dalmatians, the animated version, which was a Daycare Favorite.

Once Serene gave us the thumbs up and confirmed that kidlet sleepover equipment was in place courtesy of the Operations team, I figured it was safe to share, so caught Dad up on the new, revised plan.

He nodded slowly once I was done. “I understand why your mother wants you to go tonight if you’re going. After what happened in Guantanamo, no one would expect you to do anything other than go to bed and regroup. But are you girls sure this is the right thing to do? Especially since your husbands have no idea of what’s going on?”

“There’s plenty of times you don’t know what Angela’s doing, Sol,” Amy said as she spread the blueprint copies out on our dining room table. “That doesn’t mean she shouldn’t be doing it.”

To Dad’s great credit he didn’t make comparisons between our skill levels and Mom’s. “True enough. Let me know if you need any help. I’m going to keep an eye on the kids.” Dad gave me a kiss and went to the playroom.

Another knock at the door revealed Buchanan and Adriana. It was clear Buchanan had been dressed by Algar, because he, too, had a band logo T-shirt—Buchanan apparently favored Motörhead. I approved. Meaning Adriana was odd girl out. Went to my closet. “Really? Adriana doesn’t get a shirt?” A shirt appeared. “Thank you, King of the Elves.” Trotted out and handed it to her. “We have a theme.”

She laughed. “Nightwish! I love them.”

“I guessed.” I guessed because it was the band on the shirt, but why spoil the illusion that I’d been this prescient?

“Is this everyone?” Buchanan asked.

Did a fast headcount—me, Amy, Naomi, Abigail, Claudia, Lorraine, Serene, Adriana, and Buchanan. “Yep, we’re all here.”

While Adriana changed shirts, we went over the blueprints one more time. Happily, the version Amy had had been compiled by Hacker International from all the various sources, so we possessed what we felt was the most accurate representation of what Gaultier Research really looked like structurally. It looked very large, especially the three hidden, lower levels.

“I think we need to assume that the three lower levels are close to the tunnels,” Buchanan said as Adriana rejoined us. “Especially since we haven’t found an entrance from the public Gaultier facility.”

There was something about how he’d said the word “we.” “Malcolm, have you talked to Camilla about this?”

He smiled. “Who?”

“Oh, fine. I still think Chuckie’s being a jerk not letting us coordinate with her on this.”

“He’s being smart,” Buchanan said dryly. “You should be used to that by now.”

“Yeah, we are,” Amy said. “So, whatever, we’ll handle it, since Kitty has a special way to get us over there. Anyway, per Big George, this room seems innocuous and should be a good place to enter and exit.” She pointed to a small room roughly in the middle of the lowest hidden level.

“Why do they want us starting at the bottom?” Abigail asked.

“Makes sense. The most hidden level that’s closest to the tunnels. I’d bet the worst stuff’s down there, so might as well get us closer to it.”

Amy nodded. “That was the thinking, yes. Check your phones—Stryker should have sent a copy of these blueprints to all of you.”

“You told them what we were doing?” Buchanan asked. He didn’t sound thrilled.

“No. They were supposed to be going with you on this raid, if you were going during the funeral, remember? Since Abigail told me Angela wanted a small team and she also didn’t mention telling the computer lab team about tonight’s raid, I told them Kitty wanted these for the official raid and that we were all going to be getting used to figuring out how to use them right tonight. I’m not a total moron.”

“Malcolm’s job is to ask those questions, Ames. But good cover story.”

“That’s what I told Walter, too, and Jennifer and Jeremy,” Amy said.

“Good, so if anyone’s looking for us, they’ll assume we’re together and working.” Our own people were the least of our worries, of course.

“How are we getting in if we can’t find the actual door?” Claudia asked. Speaking of those other worries.

Explained how the special gate worked, and where it was. Many doubts were raised about us actually getting where we wanted to go. “If Gladys could follow a dream and have it work, I can follow a blueprint and have it work.”

“And what if you’re wrong?” Buchanan asked calmly.

“Supposedly I can’t end up in a wall or inside another person, so I can test it if you want.”

“No. You’re not going over there without me, and we have no idea what we will or won’t trip going in, so it’s either you and me, only, or it’s all of us, but we’re not going to play around. Once we go, we go.”

“Fine. In the same vein, we can study this all night long, or we can get moving. Mom wanted me to make sure that no one’s going merely for the thrill, or because they think they’ll be considered less worthy or anything. If even a part of you thinks this is a bad idea, you’ll do us more good staying here.”

There were a few moments of silence. Naomi’s hand went up, then Abigail’s, and Amy’s.

“I brought extra bombs for everyone,” Serene said, sounding disappointed. “I mean, I’m sure it won’t be a problem if they don’t divide up evenly now that three of you aren’t going.”

“Wait, what?” Amy asked. “I thought we were raising our hands to show we were in! That’s why I put my hand up.”

“Me too,” Abigail said.

“Three,” Naomi said. “I already said I was going, no ifs, ands, or buts. Thought I was being the tough girl leading the way and showing my solidarity with our leader.”

We girls all burst into laughter, Buchanan looked like he thought he was now chaperoning a Senior Girl Scout Troop, and Serene happily handed out her Bomb Party Favors.

“I also have twenty-petabyte flash drives for each of us, so that should we find the data, we can download the data,” Amy said, as she handed her Geek Party Favors out.

“Can we download that data without one of the hackers?” There had been a good reason to want them along, after all.

Lorraine and Claudia nodded. “Sure,” Lorraine said. “How hard could it be?”

“We work with computers all the time,” Claudia added.

“We can always call Stryker,” Amy said. “It’s not like they ever seem to sleep.”

Buchanan shook his head. “Well, we’re a finely oiled machine already, Missus Chief. I’m betting we get caught within three minutes of arriving.”

“Oh, Malcolm, you disappoint me. I expect to be caught within one minute and then talk my way out of it. Like always.”