Alien Research

CHAPTER 20

THE COLLECTIVE GASP from the majority of the people around me was impressive. Figured the same was happening worldwide. Having Gladys compromised wasn’t quite as bad as having all of Alpha and Airborne compromised, but it was close, and since they were all in trouble, we were officially at the definition of DEFCON Worse.

I carried on. “Do not respond to any of Gladys’ directives. If you are responding to one right now, cease immediately and advise me and the Embassy of what said action was. If she, or anyone saying they have her authorization or orders, contacts you, you are to not respond or reply and to advise both me and the American Centaurion Embassy immediately.”

William’s voice came into my headset. “Ambassador, Mister Buchanan asked that I be hooked into your call with acting-Commander White.”

“Good call.” Chose not to comment about Christopher’s new old title. For all I knew, I was going to have to reactivate Jeff, regardless of his current position within the U.S. government.

“Kitty, I could hear your announcement over here at Home Base,” Christopher said, sounding worried. “Which means there’s a good chance it was piped through to Dulce.”

“No,” William said. “I was on prior and coordinated, Commander White. I sent the directive to you at Home Base, but prevented it from going to Dulce.”

“You rock, William.”

“Thank you, Ambassador. Would you prefer that I call you Commander?”

“Nah, titles matter a lot more to Christopher than they do to me. Did you want to tell me something or just let me know you’d taken over being the Voice in the Sky?”

“I wanted to ask something and tell you something. Is the rest of your strike force on their headsets, Doctor Hernandez in particular?”

My team all verified they were on the group chat. “What do you need, William?” Tito asked.

“What Centaurion information do you have on your laptop, Doctor Hernandez?” William sounded like he was working to keep his voice very calm and measured. Which boded.

“Not that much, just medical information that relates to my job or the research I’m doing. Why?”

William cleared his throat. “Because if what’s coming in from our bases is correct, we’ve lost all our data. And when I say ‘all,’ I mean every scrap of information we’ve had since we arrived on the planet.”

“Today’s just going to keep on sucking until it can’t suck any more, isn’t it?” I asked of no one in particular.

“Apparently,” William replied. “Any orders, Ambassador?”

“Yeah. We need some humans who can fly things over at Caliente Base. I’m hesitant to pull in regular military help, mostly because we’re so unclear on what’s actually going on. But if my team needs backup, I’d like it to arrive via means other than a gate.”

“We’re unable to provide personnel status right now, Ambassador. We’re still essentially offline.”

“Fabulous.” Contemplated my options. They seemed remarkably slim. “Okay, please ask Luke Air Force Base to get prepped and ready. Same for Miramar—we may need some Top Gun pilots again.”

“This is sounding a lot like when you first joined us,” Christopher said.

“Isn’t it, though? William, please advise Colonel Franklin of what’s going on, but ask him to refrain from sharing the information with anyone else. Same with my Uncle Mort. I’d like the Marines standing by, but not deployed as of yet.”

“On it, Ambassador.”

“Good man. My team, start heading through the gate and join Christopher. Viola, Carmine, Romeo, get together who and what you can to support us. Romeo, that’s going to fall on you the most, but I expect the other two to help you. You three need to work like a team, and I don’t care that you probably haven’t had to do so previously. We thrive on on-the-job training around here.”

The three of them nodded. “We’ve gotten the weapons request from Mister Buchanan,” Romeo said. “Sending over to Commander White right now.”

“And I have whatever else we wanted here,” Christopher added.

“What about Field teams?” Viola asked.

“I really don’t want to throw more of our people at the problem until we know they won’t be affected by whatever’s going on over at Dulce. Get them prepped and ready, but as with human military, they’re on hold until we ask for them.”

Everyone other than White and Buchanan were through the gate. “Anything else, Ambassador?”

“Yeah. Pull in Mister Joel Oliver. Have him, and Len and Kyle if necessary, see what he can get out of Olga.”

“Grandmother told me I was needed, but not much else,” Adriana shared. “I believe she will want Len and Kyle to visit along with Mister Joel.”

Chose not to mention that she was now on a sort of first name basis with our favorite investigative journalist. Oliver had been bumped up from the ranks of the Loser Paparazzi to Our Man With The Insider Knowledge after Operation Invasion. He still wasn’t used to the love from the general populace, but he was one of the few people I knew we could trust. Apparently Olga felt the same way.

“Super. Oh, and William, please ask our friends at the Israeli and Bahraini Embassies to also be on standby.” Who knew if we’d need Mossad or Bahraini Royal Army support? Besides, they were all human and that meant they could all operate the machinery. And they were our friends. Had a strong feeling we were going to need all our friends shortly.

“Ready, Missus Martini?”

“Born that way, or some such, Mister White.”

White headed through the gate. “William, get Viola, Carmine, and Romeo onto our group-speak. Malcolm, after you.”

He shook his head. “No.” He looked at the gate agent. “Calibrate for two.” The agent did so, then Buchanan put his arm around me and held me tightly. “Mister Former Chief may not like it, but we can’t afford to have you tossing your cookies right now.”

With that, he stepped us through.

It only took a second, but I began to gag almost immediately. Buchanan held me tighter. It helped. My foot hit terra firma and the nausea started to subside. “That was awful,” I said when I could finally talk again.

We were in the middle of a big hangar that doubled as Home Base Command Central. As Christopher had said, we were the only people here. There was an impressive pile of weapons and ammunition nearby. We were armed for a lot of bear. Of course, they were probably armed for a lot of us, too.

Buchanan ignored Christopher’s glaring. “William, we need whoever can verify gate functionality. The Ambassador’s weakness with the gates is known, especially to those higher up the food chain. The transfer felt . . . stronger to me than the one from the Embassy. Assume the gates have been tampered with, and don’t allow any other personnel to go through them until we have confirmation they’re all working properly.”

“Really?” I asked. “The Dome is secure.”

“But the person who would give the Dome orders is believed to have been turned,” Buchanan said patiently.

“He’s got a point,” Christopher said, as my stomach finally settled and Buchanan let go of me. “The gate felt a little odd to me, too. Only the one coming into Home Base.”

“Great, more good news. Anything else?”

“I’ve found a plane. I want to be on record that I hope either Buchanan, Tito, or Adriana can pilot it.”

“I can’t,” Tito said calmly. “I’ve taken a few lessons, because Tim insisted, but I’m a last resort.”

“I can fly, but Missus Chief has a higher pilot’s ranking than I do. Or than Adriana does,” Buchanan added with a grin.

She nodded. “I am with the doctor. I’m a last resort, not the first choice.”

“Four jets would give us a better chance,” White said thoughtfully.

“You expect us to get shot down again?” Christopher asked.

“Yeah, your dad’s right, I think it’s a possibility.”

Christopher zipped off and was back laden with what looked like parachutes. “Put these on. Regardless of who’s flying the plane or planes.”

They were parachutes. I wanted to be offended, but the intelligence behind the idea was too strong. “Good plan.”

“This isn’t a plan, Kitty. This is a hope for survival.”

“You say tomato, I say tomahto.”

“Let’s call the whole thing off,” Dad chimed in, as he put his parachute on. “I’m flying with you, kitten, whether we’re in one plane or four.”

“Why don’t we go in two?” Buchanan suggested. “I’ll take Doctor Hernandez, Adriana, you go with the Ambassador. And before you ask, Missus Chief, I’m the best pilot after you.”

“No argument, Malcolm. But I have a better idea.”

“Really? I’m sure you and Former Pontifex White are correct—they’re going to attempt to shoot us down.”

“They might. But not if they can’t see us coming.”