by Gini Koch
“Speaking of their appearance, what’s it like to be married to President Martini? Did you always know he was bound for greatness?” Kristie blinked her eyes. Wasn’t sure if this was a coded message or what.
Would have liked to have known what the code was, because this was a boomerang question, since I’d thought we’d covered this already. Managed not to either say that my husband was the hottest thing on two legs or ask her why she thought talking about the President’s Hotness Level was an okay question, but only because I’d had enough coffee in the greenroom which, as it turned out, was not actually green. Just barely enough, but enough.
Went with basically what I’d already said. “Well, Jeff’s always been a leader, since before I knew him. So him advancing as he has wasn’t at all surprising to me.”
Kristie nodded and blinked her eyes. “What are the aliens like?”
“Um . . .” Looked to Adam for assistance. “Which ones? I kind of thought I’d answered that. I mean, I assume you guys have footage of the various different races that are on Earth. Sort of thing.”
Adam looked worried. “Kristie, you asked that already, hon.”
“What are the aliens like?” she asked again, still sounding perky. And she blinked again.
“Ah, maybe we should go to commercial?” Adam asked, looking around for some kind of direction.
Might have been tired, groggy, and unhappy to be here. Might have been potentially the least interesting FLOTUS interview of all time. But what I wasn’t was stupid or all that forgetful.
“What! Are! The! Aliens! Like?” Kristie perked, eyes blinking like mad.
And I groaned, as I unhooked my heels from the rung on the chair and slid to my feet. “Seriously? Not again!” Then I tackled Kristie to the ground.
CHAPTER 3
IT WAS A TOSS-UP—whether she was an android or a Fem-Bot. My money was on Fem-Bot, but I never ruled out android. Or clone. Or some other fun combination. She was definitely stronger than I’d expect your average female morning host to be, even if she worked out.
“Clear the set,” I shouted to Adam. “She’s going to explode!”
Had to hand it to him, and perhaps it was the athletic training, but Adam didn’t question. He leaped up and started shouting for people to evacuate.
Meanwhile, what I was going to consider the Kristie-Bot—until such time as android or clone was proven—and I were tussling. Strong though she was, she wasn’t fighting all that hard or all that well—either she had a major glitch going or her whole purpose was to blow up around me. Which was par for my particular course.
But she wasn’t blowing up.
Not that this was a bad thing. I mean, I didn’t want her to blow me up, let alone Adam, the studio audience, the crew, or the set itself. But I’d now tackled this Fem-Bot on live television and something needed to happen.
While we rolled around on the floor, considered if this was, in fact, her robotic job—make me react and look horrifically bad to half of the population of the United States. If so, she was spot on and I’d fallen for it. Big time.
Meaning I had to prove this thing I was fighting wasn’t a human. Ripping her head off seemed the easiest way, but I wasn’t sure if I wanted that shown on national TV, either. And what if she was an android? Those had what looked like blood inside. And if she was a clone that would be even worse.
Noted that the studio audience hadn’t left. Also noted that we were still being filmed, meaning the cameramen and the rest of the crew also hadn’t left. Nice to see how seriously they took this. Of course, it probably looked like the First Lady had lost her mind, and lots of people enjoyed a chick fight, so them all sticking around made sense. Though not if the Kristie-Bot exploded. Then them all sticking around would just make a tragedy.
Adam was the only other person reacting in what I felt was the appropriate manner, not that anyone was paying attention to him or listening to his advice to clear the area. Of course, everyone was here to see or put on a show, and that was definitely what I was doing at the moment.
Before I could decide what to do, a man ran out from backstage. He was vaguely familiar, but I was pretty sure I’d never met him before. He was handsome in sort of George Clooney-ish way.
He spoke quietly to Adam, who nodded, then both men came over to me and the Kristie-Bot. The man I didn’t know reached down and pulled me up and off of the Kristie-Bot and Adam helped her up. She wasn’t blinking anymore. She was standing there smiling.
The man who pulled me up let go. Then he started clapping. “Isn’t she great folks? Kitty, thank you, and Kristie, thanks for being such a good sport. Code Name: First Lady is going to be amazing, folks, and you’ve got that as a guarantee from me, Jürgen Cologne!”
The audience went wild, screaming and cheering. The Kristie-Bot took a bow. I managed to keep my jaw from dropping.
The reason he’d reminded me of George Clooney was because he was literally being billed as the “next” Clooney in looks and talent. He was also a quadruple threat—actor, writer, director, and producer. Well, at least I now knew who I was “fighting” in terms of Code Name: First Lady. Pity that this man tended to get his way, usually through charm, smarts, a really strong will, and greater-than-average perseverance.
Cologne went on. “Now you can see why we’re trying so hard to make the First Lady star in her own movie. She’s a natural!”
More wild cheering from the studio audience. Decided that I hated each and every one of them. Forever. Potentially not as much as I was going to hate Cologne, though.
“Back after these messages,” Adam shouted over the din. And this time, the crew actually did as requested and stopped filming. Or at least, stopped the feed to the network.
“I believe I speak for Adam as well as myself when I ask what the hell is going on?” Realized the mics were turned off, too, for which I was exceedingly grateful. Figured Raj had something to do with that.
I’d directed this question to Cologne, but he’d turned away from me and motioned urgently toward the curtains the upcoming guests hid behind. My Secret Service and Field agent protective details raced out, along with my personal driver and bodyguard, Len Parker and Kyle Constantine. The five Field agents surrounded the Kristie-Bot while the Secret Service moved Adam away from her and nearer to me and Cologne. Len and Kyle flanked me.
Manfred, the troubadour who was the head of this detail, had a small Organic Validation Sensor in his hand and he ran it all around the Kristie-Bot. The OVS looked like the wands they used at airports and concerts to do polite searches for metal and other unsavory things. But the OVS had been created to help us identify who was a real living being and who was not.
Manfred was behind the Kristie-Bot, and he nodded to the other Field agents on the team. Daniel and Marcus, who were both empaths and, therefore, bigger than Joshua and Lucas, who were imageers, each grabbed one of the Kristie-Bot’s arms. She didn’t struggle. At all.
“Emotions,” Daniel said.
Marcus nodded. “Plenty of them.”
“So, she’s an android, not a Fem-Bot?” Just wanted to be sure and all.
“I’m better,” the Kristie-Bot said with a smirk.
“She’s dangerous, whatever she is,” Len growled softly.
“She’s on the borderline,” Manfred answered. “Could be human with a lot of surgeries, could be a clone, possibly an android that doesn’t have as much internal inorganic as the first generations did. Unlikely to be a Fem-Bot—they rate higher on the nonorganic scale.”
“Whatever she is, she’s going to explode. I realize she hasn’t yet, but I also realize that—”
“She was sent to discredit you,” Cologne finished. “We figured that out backstage.” He shot me a megawatt Hollywood smile. “That’s why I came out.” He looked at the Kristie-Bot. “You have a choice. Try to self-destruct and we’ll get rid of you. Or tel
l us who sent you and we’ll help you.”
She smirked again. “I’m the most popular morning host in the country, which means in the world. You can’t do anything to me.”
Manfred, meanwhile, had run the OVS over Adam. “Fully human,” he said quietly to me. “Eighty-seven percent organic.”
“I have a hip replacement,” Adam said. “And I’m doing my best not to freak out, but we’ll be back from commercial soon and I really wish someone would tell me what’s actually going on.”
The Kristie-Bot shrugged. “I don’t plan to ‘self-destruct,’” she made the air quotes sign, “at all. I plan to go back on the air and finish our show.” She smiled sweetly at me. “And now we can discuss how the First Lady really wants to make her movie.”
Looked at Cologne. “Is this some horrific, elaborate ruse to get me on board with the whole Code Name: First Lady thing?”
He shook his head. “No. I was coming on to try to convince you on-air to give the movie the green light.”
“So, you were trying to, what, blackmail me to give the okay?”
Got another shot of the megawatt smile. “Oh, I wouldn’t put it quite that way.” His smile faded and he turned back the Kristie-Bot. “What’s your game?”
She batted her eyelashes at him. “I want you to hire me.”
We all stared at her.
“Back in thirty,” someone called from offstage.
“Um, come again?” I asked, for everyone within ear- and eyeshot.
She rolled her eyes, then smiled at Cologne. “I want to be in Code Name: First Lady. As one of the stars.”
CHAPTER 4
WITH THAT BOLD CAREER demand sitting on the air, the Kristie-Bot turned and went back to her chair.
“Ten seconds,” the dude called. “Adam, get to your seat!”
Adam shot me the “what now?” look. Didn’t feel we had a lot of choice. “Um, I guess, the show must go on. And all that.” Looked to Manfred. “Do the fast fade, gang.”
My security teams unwillingly disappeared behind the curtains offstage—mostly because Raj ordered them to in no uncertain terms—while Adam, Cologne, and I scurried to our chairs. We were seated just in time.
“And . . . we’re back!” the Kristie-Bot exclaimed gleefully, mics all live to the world again. “Folks, wasn’t that just the most exciting thing? Adam, I’m sorry we didn’t let you in on what we were doing. Jürgen wanted to have you show a normal person’s reaction to the First Lady’s kind of action!”
Had to hand it to her, she was back in form as the Perkiest of the Perky. And I was now completely wide awake, so decided to count that as one for the win column since I doubted I was going to get more tickie marks over there any time soon.
“Ah . . .” Adam seemed lost at sea. I was with him in the lifeboat that was probably leaking. “Yeah. That was . . . exciting.”
Realized I had no idea if I was supposed to have been “in” on the “fight scene” or if I was allowed to share that I’d been clueless. Decided that, as my unwilling public appearances went, this was definitely going to go down as the worst of the worst.
Thankfully, Cologne spoke up before I could. “That’s the kind of action I like to bring to the movie screens.” He started talking about his movie career and, thankfully, Adam and the Kristie-Bot let him. I didn’t come up, so I sat there doing my best to look interested while I listened with one ear for cues that I’d need to speak and focused on what the Kristie-Bot really might be.
She’d been around too long to be a new alien race we didn’t know about, barring her being the sole survivor of her race, which seemed unlikely. So that meant the choices were pretty much only Made From Scratch Android, Willing Android, Fem-Bot, or Clone With Benefits. Unwilling Android was not a choice—the unwilling ones tended to have real problems discussing their lack of being fully human, to the point of normally self-destructing.
Speaking of unwilling, two of our Top Gun Navy Pilots, Joe Billings and Randy Muir, had been partially androidized, very much against their will. We’d saved them before the full process—thin wires being inserted into their heads and bodies via some advanced scientific and alien means—had finished. However, we couldn’t remove the wires, and Joe and Randy were now both more like the Six Million Dollar Man than regular human dudes. This was the most recent method of android creation we knew about, though I never put it past our enemies to come up with new and improved ways to do evil. But if I had to bet, if Kristie was an android, she’d gone in for the New Wiring Method.
We did have androids made from real, living people who’d had most of their human innards removed and robotic insides put in. We had two of these still alive and working with us—Col. John Butler and former Vice Presidential nominee Cameron Maurer. In both cases, we’d barely managed to keep them from self-destructing when they’d realized what they were, but we’d been able to shut them down and remove their self-destruct mechanisms.
Charles Reynolds, who was my best friend since ninth grade and also now the Director of the CIA, felt there were probably more androids like this out there, and Chuckie was pretty much never wrong. But so far, we hadn’t found them.
Of course, an androidized clone also wasn’t out of the question. But before I could consider that, or any other possibilities, a question was tossed to me.
“Beg pardon?” I’d been able to tell it was a question for me, since everyone was looking at me. My ears had heard the sounds, but my brain hadn’t comprehended the words those sounds made. “Could you repeat the question?”
The Kristie-Bot smirked at me. Decided she was staying the Kristie-Bot regardless of what she turned out to actually be inside because she really bugged me and I refused to choose another moniker for her therefore. “We want to know which one of Jürgen’s movies is your favorite. If you can remember.”
Well, lucky me. Jeff was big into old TV shows, so I was well versed in those, and I’d seen lots of movies when I’d been younger, of course. But, while we hit the occasional movie, we didn’t get a lot of opportunity these days, and the White House theater was being used for alien- and space exploration-type things more than entertainment.
So I hadn’t seen a lot of his movies, but I’d seen some. One in particular, and I’d loved it. Made very early in Cologne’s career, but that might hopefully play in my favor. “I’m a big fan of Revenge of the Broccoli.”
Cologne snorted a laugh. “I think that makes you that movie’s one and only fan.”
“Dude, it was hilarious. I mean, there was no budget, and the script was meant to be sort of dumb, but all of you were acting your fuzzy little hearts out and it’s great for what it is. Satire at its finest. Sort of thing.”
Cologne gave me what looked like a genuine smile. “It’s nice to know that someone appreciated that movie. Makes all the negative reviews sting less.”
“As I well know, everyone’s a critic. As long as you’re doing the best you can, for the right reasons, no one else’s opinion should matter.”
“And that’s why you’re currently the most popular First Lady we’ve had, potentially ever,” Adam said.
“Huh?”
“Oh your poll numbers are very high,” the Kristie-Bot said. “You must know that.”
“I honestly don’t pay attention to stuff like that.” Mostly because I didn’t want to start my days depressed, angry, or wanting to hide under the covers. Call me a worrywart. Or, rather, a realist.
Adam grinned. “Well, it’s true. The people love you.”
“And I love them right back.” Risked my life enough to protect them, after all. I’d better feel some sort of love.
This earned me a big round of applause as we cut to another commercial. All this mental contemplation and verbal gymnastics had given me a headache. Wondered if I could score a Coke and some Advil, but doubted I’d get that lucky. The not-really-greenroom was only for
when you weren’t on camera.
Opened my mouth, but Adam beat me to the punch. “Again, I want to know, what the hell is going on?” Thankfully, again, the mics were off, so we weren’t sharing this with the studio audience.
“I do, too,” Cologne said, to the Kristie-Bot. “Why did you do what you did? Blackmail?”
She shrugged. “It was effective.”
“She’s not a human, at least not a full one,” I reminded everyone.
She rolled her eyes. “Human, alien, android, Amazon, giant slug—ultimately, what’s the difference?”
“Usually homicidal tendencies and really nasty attitudes.”
The Kristie-Bot laughed. “That’s what makes us kin, so to speak. Some of the aliens are pacifists, but humans aren’t, and you know it.” She flexed her shoulders. “Some of us can see the advantages of taking the next step in terms of evolution.”
“Androids can’t evolve.” Of course, no sooner were the words out of my mouth than I realized they were wrong. Presuming that the Kristie-Bot was, in fact, an android, and also presuming she’d willingly become one in the past few months, then, depending on how you looked at it, she’d evolved. In fact, realistically, androids were evolving at a faster pace than any other life-form on the planet. “You can’t reproduce.”
She heaved a sigh. “Really?”
Again, realized I was wrong. Cloning meant that you could create a version of yourself, raise it, then shove wires into it and make it “better.” And Stephanie Valentino was hiding out at one of Late Semi-Great Madman Herbert Gaultier’s old production plants, and we were pretty sure she’d copied if not stolen all of the Mastermind’s information. Plus, she was being helped by the same person who’d helped her great-grandfather become the First Mastermind. And this kind of thing was right up the Tinkerer’s alley.