by Gini Koch
“BODY BURNING SOUNDS like a good idea,” Jeff said as he joined us. “You two okay?”
Nodded as we separated. “We both killed the people that hurt us the most. So yeah. How are you?”
Jeff shrugged. “I killed the original, human Reid. Killing some enhanced clones wasn’t a problem—all I had to do was think back to what he’d wanted to do to you and killing them was easy.” He reached out and pulled me to him. “I felt what you went through, baby. I’m proud of you for facing your biggest fear, getting through it, and coming out even stronger on the other side.”
Couldn’t help it, had to kiss him. Jeff obliged, of course. He ended our kiss just before I started grinding against him. Couldn’t complain—we weren’t exactly in private. “So,” I asked when we ended our kiss far too soon, “are you okay? Do you need an adrenaline harpoon?”
“I feel fine, honestly. And no, I’m not lying. I don’t need it at all.” He shrugged at the hairy eyeball look I knew I was giving him. “Honestly, baby, the barrage of emotions is just sort of . . . there. I can feel it, I can access it, but they aren’t hurting me.”
“I’ll take it.” Perhaps the Powers That Be were doing Jeff a solid for once. Chose not to worry, question, or complain.
He looked around. “Kozlow’s gone.”
“We’ll catch him.”
“Let’s hope, or else your mother’s going to really give it to us.”
“Cliff felt that his last doomsday plan was going to roll no matter what,” Chuckie said worriedly as Jeff reached out and pulled him in for a group hug. “We need to figure out what that was and neutralize it.”
“Maybe he meant the Aicirtap,” Jeff suggested.
Thought about it as my music changed to “Same Shit, Different Drink” by Lit. “No, I don’t think so. I mean, with a name like Close Encounter it clearly deals with alien arrivals. But he said that he could have saved everyone, and I think he meant the Aicirtap when he said that. But this was a separate thing.”
Reader joined us as we stopped hugging. “What the hell is that lizard thing?”
“No clue, but Mossy might know. Not sure why he and Siler aren’t down here.”
“Oh, we’re here now,” Siler said, sounding a little tense. Turned to see him and Mossy walking with their hands up. A lot of G-Company thugs with guns were with them. So was Kozlow, and he was with the man Wruck had imitated—Gadhavi was in the house.
“Let me handle this, and I mean it, stay out of it,” I said to the men with me. Pulled off Siler’s shirt on the way over to them and handed it to him. “Thanks for letting me borrow that. Mister Ali Baba Gadhavi, formerly of India, now of Bahrain, head of G-Company, I presume?”
He nodded to me. “I understand that you have caused some . . . issues within my organization this past day. I don’t appreciate that.”
“Yeah? Here’s what you might want to think about. Cliff Goodman, he who is dead on the floor over there next to an alien life-form none of us recognize, had plans, big plans. Many of which centered around taking over your entire operation. The way I see it, we just did you a huge favor.”
“These are just words from a lying woman’s mouth.”
“Uh huh. Francine or Adriana, whichever one of you other lying women has the proof, trot it over here.”
Francine joined us and pulled a thick ledger out of her purse. “You’ll be particularly interested in what’s on pages fifty-seven through seventy-two. There’s more, but that will give you the gist.”
Gadhavi flipped to the pages mentioned. He read a bit, flipped some more, read some more, and so on. His countenance got darker and darker. He slammed the ledger shut and looked up. “I apologize for my earlier words. You are indeed a woman of truth. I appreciate your removing this viper from my nest.”
“Great. So, you can keep that, a little present from us.” Had to figure that Adriana had sent this over to the hackers to be copied and if not, oh well. Trades were made when one was working at this level of diplomacy. “In return, we’d appreciate it if you’d choose to not be upset about our clearing out all of the remaining Al Dejahl strongholds, as well as removing all of Cliff’s dangerous biochemical weapons and neutralizing most of his doomsday plans.”
“Most?” Ah, so he was also an attentive bear. Hard to call him a teddy bear in person. Grizzly might have been more accurate.
“Yes, there’s one we were just trying to decipher when your august presence arrived.”
“Was that sarcasm?”
“No, not really. I enjoy sarcasm as much as the next girl, but in this case, meeting the head of G-Company is kind of a thrill.”
He studied me. “You do not plan to try to arrest me?”
Snorted. “Hardly. We’re not here on that kind of business. Frankly, with the way things are going, I’m betting that most of the underworld is going to have to actually step up and get involved in more than sex, drugs, extortion, gambling, and the rest of your pursuits. The world is changing, and you’re going to have to adapt or die. People like you, who run huge, successful organizations, have a lot to offer.”
He stared at me. “You mean that. I must mention that no one with you seems to be in agreement.”
“Oh, I’m sure they’re not. I’m just willing to see things differently, call me an out of the box thinker. However, the killing and drugs and the sex trafficking and the hurting and all that jazz would have to go. I’m just saying that we’re all humanity, all Earthlings together, as we meet the rest of our vast galaxy. From here on in, this is going to be one world that’s a nation of aliens. Adapt or die. I’m voting for adaptation, and, based on what little I know of you, I’m betting that you’re going to go for adaptation, too.”
“I have people quite dear to me whom the aliens saved this past evening. And I agree that the world is about to change.” He nodded to me. “I will mull over what you have said. Use all the power here that you might need, and then please destroy this area as you see fit. We part as friends and, should we meet again, I hope that it will be as friends again.” He looked at his troops. “Come. We have business to conduct.” They nodded to him, took their guns off of all of us, and headed upstairs.
Gadhavi turned and started for the stairs. Kozlow stayed where he was. Gadhavi turned back. “Why are you not coming, Russell?” So, Kozlow had moved up to first name status. “When you came to tell me what was happening here I told you that, were your words true, I would ensure that you never had to enter the United States again, and that I will protect you from any who sought to imprison you.”
“I know.” Kozlow looked at me then back to Gadhavi. “But I gave her my word.”
Gadhavi cocked his head. “Interesting. You will go back with her, to a lifetime of incarceration, simply because you gave her your word?”
“Yes. Because I gave it to her, Mister Gadhavi.”
Gadhavi didn’t look convinced. Couldn’t blame him.
“Someone very important to him lives with me. Trust me, if that wasn’t the case, he’d be leaping at your extremely generous and kind offer. And I mean that. Many men in your position enjoy killing the messengers.”
“Mohammed was a messenger. And, perhaps, as you so eloquently said earlier, the only thing that matters is that we go forward together, regardless of which messenger we have listened to for all of our lives.” He bowed to me. “Until we meet again.” Then he turned and headed up the stairs, the rest of his troops following him.
CHAPTER 91
“WELL, THAT WAS FUN,” Jeff said as “It’s Not Over” by Daughtry came on my airwaves. “You get to explain what just went on to your mother.”
“No problem. Well, in the grand scheme of things, not compared to figuring out what the Close Encounter Doomsday Plan actually is.”
Looked around the lab. There had to be something, something here, that would be the trigger, or Cliff wouldn’t have thought this plan would still
activate.
“I believe we can use the machine to, ah, clean up,” Wruck said as he joined us, once again looking as I was used to.
“We’ll need to plug it back in, but yeah, that’s a good idea. It’s not the same, killing a clone versus the real deal, is it?” Frankly, I felt great about it, but I hadn’t spent decades trying to find and neutralize my enemy.
He shook his head. “But it was satisfying. The brain was LaRue’s, albeit warped. She could no longer shift. She tried, I felt it, but she didn’t have the ability.”
“Glad you still do. Okay, um, gang, let’s get the remains into piles for scary dust creating services.”
“Only those with strong stomachs should clear out the other room,” Siler said. Rahmi shrugged and went in there with him.
While the others started dragging the bodies in this room toward the Killer Octopus, stared at the giant lizard. “Seriously, what planet is that from?”
“None I know of,” Wruck said.
“I don’t know it, either,” Mossy shared. “It was almost impossible to kill.”
And the Poofs, which had gone small and disappeared the moment Gadhavi had arrived, hadn’t eaten it. And they were carnivores and tended to eat their kills. If those kills were organic. Normally the Poofs would have done cleanup here, too, but they were avoiding the clones as well.
“It’s not a real thing, whatever it is. It’s created. And, based on it being a giant dino-type thing that could also shift into a pet lizard, I’m going to spitball that it was created and snuck in here by the Z’porrah.”
“Sounds like them,” Mossy said. “And it could also be a new uplift that’s changed the race so much we can’t recognize it.”
“It’s always something. Zap it last, I guess.”
“We could send it to Dulce for study,” Jeff suggested, sounding less than enthusiastic.
“I think that would be wise,” Wruck said. “It could help us prepare for attack.”
Jeff sighed and trotted over to James. They plugged the Killer Octopus back into the wall. I took the time to look around some more. The TV was still showing the Treeship. Spotted the Vatusan ships around it, helicarrier included. They were uncloaked and shining lights on the Treeship and on the water, and they’d probably been doing that for a while, since I’d been able to see the Treeship on TV even though it was night. Well, early morning now.
“We should search for clues while we have time. Along with anything else of value to us.” Some of the others nodded and wandered off, presumably to do just that.
Siler came out of the other room and went over to Jeff and Reader. “Let’s see if we can move that in here.”
Jeff didn’t argue—knew he was reading Siler’s emotions even if he was protected from them. Instead the two of them, helped by White and Christopher, all shoved the Killer Octopus toward the doorway between the two rooms. It had a long cord, so they were able to leave it plugged in.
Chuckie squared his shoulders and went into the room before the machine was in place. Heaved a sigh and went after him. You didn’t let your best friend see something like this alone.
There was nothing to see, though, because Rahmi and Siler had the bodies piled up and under a tarp. Well, there was still a lot of fluid that didn’t look quite like real blood around. Figured this would be similar to the blood Tito had taken from the Casey Clone and actively avoided stepping in it.
Otherwise, this was a combination cloning nursery, exercise area, and mess hall, all in one. Had to hand it to Cliff—he’d made do with limited space. No TV in here, no books, no radio, no art. To call it Spartan would have been overstating the décor.
“Trust me,” Rahmi said, putting her hand on Chuckie’s shoulder as he bent to lift the tarp. “You don’t need to see it.”
“Were any of them . . . me?” he asked quietly.
“No,” Siler said, as the Killer Octopus moved into place. “Leave it at that.”
Chuckie nodded and stood up.
“Chuck, let’s see if this thing is easy to handle or not,” Jeff said gently.
Told Chuckie what I’d seen Cliff doing when he’d fiddled with the knobs, and Chuckie examined the machine before he did anything. “You and Rahmi should get out of the way,” he said. “I have no idea how hard this is to control—Cliff being in a wheelchair gave him a different center of gravity.”
Rahmi pointed. “We’ll go search these other areas.” There were indeed a few small rooms off of this one, which we trotted over to.
One was a bathroom that hadn’t been cleaned in a long time, though it wasn’t the worst I’d ever seen, seeing as I’d visited some bad ones in my time with Centaurion Division. Searched it as carefully as possible, including and especially for a gate, found nothing but gross, and finished just as the lights went out.
Waited out of range while Chuckie zapped the tarp and what it was hiding for a good long while. Finally, he stopped, the lights came back on, and we could see quite a large pile of dust on the floor in front of him.
There were two more small rooms, one of which was a walk-in closet with a lot of white suits along with other things, including clothes for kids. Chose not to think about it. Instead, we searched all the clothing, but found nothing of interest.
The last room contained cleaning supplies, which, considering the state of the bathroom, was a shock. Nothing relevant in here, either.
Moving the Killer Octopus back was harder than moving it to the doorway, because the four A-Cs were on the pull versus the push side. Rahmi and I helped Chuckie shove—after making sure the nozzle was in the off position—and we got the thing moved enough that Jeff and the others could get on our side and push it the rest of the way.
“Some genius,” I said to Chuckie as he, Rahmi, and I caught our breath. “Who doesn’t put wheels on a thing like that?”
He barked a laugh, then joined the other men to get ready to zap again. “I don’t think we want to do as many at a time from now on. Just in case.”
Rahmi and I went back in and searched the rest of the other room. “Not much here,” she said when we were done. “I don’t understand it. Based on what Adriana and her team found, I’d expected to find much more here.”
“I think he kept more at the Burj Khalifa because it was safer, in that sense.”
“Perhaps.” Rahmi didn’t sound convinced.
“Perhaps we’ll never know.”
She nodded. “Or perhaps we’ll discover that Cliff had a more secure area we just haven’t found yet.”
We went back out and checked on the Treeship’s progress. It was closer to the water.
Noted that we were missing most of the team, but they returned just as I was so noting. “Couldn’t find anything outside,” Buchanan said, sounding frustrated. “If he planned to launch something from this island, it’s hidden beyond what any of us can discover.”
Checked Mr. Watch. Somehow, despite feeling that we’d only been on this island for a few minutes, all of this had taken a hefty chunk of time—we were getting close to dawn. And we hadn’t found a single thing that would tell any of us what the Close Encounter Doomsday Plan was.
Turned away from the TV and looked behind me. There was a whole bank of extremely old-fashioned computers on the wall opposite the one Jeff and the others had been strapped against. Several chairs had gotten toppled during the fighting, but the computer system appeared to be running.
The next, lesser pile of bodies from the many we had in this room was tested, with Chuckie again at the controls. While the Killer Octopus zapped a bunch of Reid clones and the dismembered portions of LaRue, we again lost the lights and the TV while the backup lights came on again this time. But the computer system didn’t stop. Meaning it was on the main system and the backup generator both.
“Chuckie, let someone else have a turn with the new toy. I need you over here. And,
seriously, dudes, we need to get the giant dead lizard over to Dulce before it starts to smell.”
Reader took over Nozzle Control, Jeff manned the plug just in case, while Tim called for Rexie transport and Chuckie came to me. “What are you thinking?”
“That whatever the Close Encounter Plan is, it’s tied to this ancient computer.”
Wruck, Mossy, Chuckie, and I all stepped closer. Chuckie examined everything. “There’s a timer. It shows seventeen minutes.” As we look at what he was pointing to, the timer flipped to sixteen minutes.
The power came back on. Looked over my shoulder to see how the team was planning to move the Long Armed Rexie corpse in order to send it through a floater gate, when the TV came back on at the same time as my music changed to “Blues Before And After” by The Smithereens. The Treeship looked close enough to the water that I had to figure it was going to land in the next few minutes.
“When is dawn here?” I shouted to the room at large, as the next pile of dead bodies got zapped and we lost all power to everything other than the creepy lights and this computer system. “As in, is it within fifteen minutes?”
“Yes,” Kozlow replied. “Almost exactly.”
“Crap.”
CHAPTER 92
“RUSSELL, did Cliff have Nerida doing anything in the water of the gulf?”
“Yes, he had her put water mines around the dock and the island so that no one could arrive unannounced.”
“So, he could turn those mines on and off?”
“Yes. Though I don’t know how.”
Anyone who’d know how was dead now, which was an irony I was going to totally ignore. And Nerida had been powerful. Maybe not precise, but powerful. For all we knew, her clones had been placed near to every mine so that she could pull them out of the water as needed. Or send them deeper down.
Looked at Chuckie, who’d clearly made the leap along with me, based on the look of horror on his face. “Close Encounter is the doomsday plan for when aliens arrive. LaRue would have known about the landing area in these waters and, if not, the Z’porrah certainly do, and Cliff would have known that this day would come and come sooner as opposed to later. There’s at least one mine attached to the structure the Treeship is going to try to connect to. Christopher!”