Alien Research

CHAPTER 76

“DO I TAKE VANDER’S CALL OR NOT?” Chuckie asked.

“Take it and tell him you’re in a meeting, making progress, and that you’ll call him back. And hurry. I’m saving this until you’re done.”

This earned me a dirty look, but Chuckie got up and walked out of the room as he answered. “Vander, it’s been so long since we talked. What, half a day?”

“You’re really going to make us wait until he’s back in the room?” Christopher asked.

“Yep.” Took the opportunity to eat some more and get my thoughts into a semblance of order. “Len, Kyle, we need Adriana. Can you guys see if she’s free?”

“Mister Joel Oliver’s at the Romanian Embassy,” Len said. “Olga asked him to stay. You want him, too?”

“Could my saying no actually keep him away? Besides, he’s always good for insights. And of course if Olga wants to come over and see if any of us have caught up or caught on, she’s always welcome.”

Len and Kyle trotted out. Without calling or texting anyone. Had a feeling Adriana, Oliver, and Olga were already all on standby and just waiting for their official invitation.

Uncle Mort got up. “I’m going to send in an order to keep all those prisoners at Guantanamo. Some politicians won’t like it, and I’ll be sure we note which ones. I’ll be back when Charles is.”

“While we wait for you to actually tell us what you think is going on, Kitty,” Stryker said from Hacker Headquarters, “you want what we got on Chernobog?”

“Yes. She’s in Cuba, near Guantanamo, maybe actually physically on the American side, and absolutely using their computer systems.”

All five Hackers had clearly been taking glaring lessons from Christopher, because I was getting a full pantheon of glares from them, even Omega Red.

“Way to steal a guy’s moment,” Stryker grumbled.

“Part of my charm. Why pick Guantanamo unless someone they needed to work with was there? There are plenty of bases around the world, hell, they were at Home Base originally, so that one had to be chosen for more reasons than Mahin being taken there.”

“Fine, still don’t see how you made the leap that Chernobog’s on the American side,” Stryker said.

“That’s because you’re convinced I’m a moron and I rarely waste time trying to convince you otherwise. As for the rest, they had too easy a time getting onto the base and running around it. Hyperspeed’s great, but that’s an active base loaded with personnel—someone was going to spot a bunch of civilians they didn’t know and ask questions. Meaning our gang was staying somewhere close to the Air Station but not necessarily right on the base. However, being on the American side means access to all that great equipment and energy, and, let’s face it—Chernobog’s an old woman by now. Why would she choose to rough it if she doesn’t have to?”

“She wouldn’t,” Olga said as Len and Kyle returned, confirming my suspicion that Team Romania had been waiting at their front door. Well, better to have allies who were eager, right?

Chuckie and Uncle Mort came back. “All taken care of,” Uncle Mort said as they seated themselves.

“Vander wants more than platitudes, Kitty,” Chuckie said. “So I want to know what you figured out, and I want to know now.”

“Dude, was only waiting for your Secret Agent Ears to return to the War Room. And that’s what this is all about. Not so much the war, but what Gaultier, Titan, and YatesCorp gain by us being at war.”

“Titan makes weapons, so I can see that one,” Uncle Mort said. “But I hope you have more than just good guessing.”

“Et tu, Uncle Wrinkle? Et tu? Of course I have more. We were more than halfway there earlier, when we were discussing what we’d have done if the Guantanamo attack had worked out how the Mastermind wanted. We’d be in chaos and running scared. We’d be looking for a new safe haven. It’s amazing how your morals shift when you think the country you swore allegiance to has betrayed you in the worst way possible.”

“You think we’d join with our enemies?” Jeff sounded appalled. It was always endearing when the reality of how basically decent the majority of A-Cs were waved at me. The humans in the room were all nodding their heads in agreement with me. The A-Cs looked shocked and uncomfortable.

Mahin, however, had been raised as a human. “Kitty’s right. Enemies of the United States would be lining up to give you all a new home base.”

“You tip the balance of power. You always have. But there’s more. If they’d succeeded in destroying the Science Center, we’d have lost, what, half of your people? And most of your women. Jeff, you’ve said this to me before—having a choice of interspecies marriage is one thing. Having no choice in the matter is another. So we’d be very open to options. And, you know, you, Serene, and Christopher are all okay, right? And Jamie and Patrick are advanced but not freaks, right?”

“I know where you’re going with this,” Jeff said. “You think we’d okay giving the new version of Surcenthumain to our people.”

“Well, you’d have to. Because regular humans would already be taking it, and that would mean they were catching up to the A-Cs. Junkies and criminals and experimental teenagers and casual drug users would all be super powered. Then, once they didn’t all drop dead, soldiers would be taking the drug.”

“Soldiers on all sides, by the way,” Tito said. “The drug replicates and continues to expand powers.”

“And it’s addictive,” Christopher added. “Very addictive. You want more because of how it makes you feel, and then you want more because of how it changes you.”

“I’m betting the new stuff is even more addictive. So self-defense and preservation would say that the A-Cs would need to bulk up in turn, so to speak.”

“You’re talking about an arms race but with drugs, versus weapons,” Chuckie said.

“I point to Exhibits A, B, and C.” I indicated Serene, Jeff, and Christopher. “What Christopher, in particular, could do after he shot up Surcenthumain for a while was nothing short of amazing. Imagine what we could do if everyone had the new strain running through their veins.”

The room was quiet for a few long moments. Amy broke the silence. “So, short of burning Gaultier to the ground, how do we expose what they’re doing?”

“I don’t think we can expose anything, Ames. Gaultier’s got too many ties to too many different yet important places. Same with YatesCorp. Hell, Titan was proven to be building freaking supersoldiers that they sent against the President of the United States and all of Congress, and yet there they are, back in business, and everyone’s acting like they just had a little run of bad management.”

“Then what are we going to do?” Naomi asked.

“We’re going to go very Old Testament on their butts.” This earned a lot of blank looks, though Mom put her head in her hand and Uncle Mort grinned.

“Mind explaining that?” Jeff asked.

“An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. We’re going to find their drugs and destroy them, along with the formulas and all their data. Sorry, Ames, but we’re going to run your father’s company out of business.”

“Fine with me,” Amy said. “I can always rebuild it, this time without secret levels of evil and aligning with every maniac in the world.”

“What does YatesCorp gain out of all of this?” Mom asked. “Their connection isn’t clear, and you can’t convince me that Amos Tobin wants to add on anyone else to their Board, let alone a bunch of unknown Yates relatives.”

“He doesn’t, I’m very sure. There’s a possibility he’s willing to add on a whole bunch of yes-men and -women to gain a stronger power base. There’s also a possibility that he’s not involved and the Yates Gene Project is being driven by Gaultier or Titan or both, so that they can gain more control of YatesCorp. There are other possibilities, too.”

“Here’s one,” Tito said. “The Yates Gene is corrupted, because of his combining with the Mephistopheles parasite, meaning the only pure samples of his DNA come from Richard, Gladys, or Lucinda.”

“Assume they have a sample from Gladys. If they wanted it, they’d have gotten it from her using mind control.”

Tito nodded. “So, based on what we know they’ve created—androids and supersoldiers and copies of every male of influence in Centaurion Division—my bet for their next steps would be cloning. The bait given to the genetic samples may be to get a seat on the YatesCorp Board. But the goal of those behind the plan may be to clone another Ronald Yates.”

“Or another Mephistopheles,” Tim suggested.

“Tito Hernandez, put on your cape and join Team Megalomania and stand right there next to Megalomaniac Lad. Because those sound like winner ideas to me. So to speak. So, we pretty much need to ensure we wipe every piece of data Gaultier has, except possibly the information on their baby wipes.”

“I wouldn’t trust those, either,” Reader said.

“Kitty, that sounds like a great plan,” Stryker said. “But you’re forgetting one thing. Chernobog is working for the other side. That means they’ll have protections in place that, frankly, we probably can’t hack.”

Looked at Olga. “But we have the best leverage in the world. And I’m not afraid to play hardball. Olga, what’s the best way for us to contact Chernobog in a private manner she’ll respond to?”

“I can provide an old KGB code that will absolutely gain her attention.”

“Boo-yah, you rock. Mahin, what’s Russell’s power? Does he have any?”

She shook her head. “I don’t know. I didn’t see any example of talent or power from him. But everyone acted as though he was very important.”

“He is and was. He was the key to getting the world’s best hacker on their side.”

“What are you planning to do with him?” Jeff asked.

“Honestly? Something I’ll only discuss with Mom, Chuckie, Kevin, Malcolm, Olga, and Uncle Mort.”

Jeff stared at me. “And why is that?”

“Because you’ll be too busy with Tito, working to finalize the identification process of the Yates Gene.”