“Eddy! How’s it going? Actually I don’t care. You and the rest of the wacky gang need to roll into action.”
“Already on it, Kitty.” Stryker sounded tense and he didn’t look away from whatever he was working on. “Ravi was talking to the reverse engineering team at Dulce and was cut off. We’ve been trying to reestablish communications ever since. It’s definitely not our side.”
“Jennifer and Jeremy were at the same training session as Walter,” Ravi added, sounding worried. Understandable—Jennifer Barone was his fiancée. She and her brother were a Field team assigned to us permanently during Operation Destruction. Jennifer was an imageer and Jeremy was an empath.
“Why were they there?” I asked.
“Gladys said they performed security here, so they needed the training,” Ravi replied.
“How long have you been trying to make contact with Dulce?” Chuckie asked before I could ask why Len and Kyle, my C.I.A.-assigned bodyguards, hadn’t been requested. Not that I wasn’t glad that they’d been with me this morning, but if Gladys had asked for the Gower girls and the Barones for this security thing, why not the boys, too? But the boys being here was, all things considered, likely to be a very good thing, so I chose not to question aloud.
“Twenty-three minutes so far.”
“That times out about to when Walter called me.”
“Have also checked with Home Base,” Big George said. “No response. On any line.”
“And we had the system auto-call every line, too,” Henry added.
“What’s the weather like around Area Fifty-One and the Science Center?” I asked.
“Clear,” Omega Red replied. “Why?”
“Because there was supposedly a huge dust storm at Home Base earlier today, which sent training exercises to Dulce. Do you have any record of such?”
They were all quiet, and every one of them was typing. “No, weather services show nothing,” Stryker said finally. “As I know you know, it’s monsoon season in Arizona and parts of New Mexico, but there are no storms in either state today.”
“Caliente Base. Someone try to reach them, right now.” This was the base in my, Chuckie, and Stryker’s hometown. It wasn’t as big as most of the others, but it was of decent size, and it also housed a great majority of the A-Cs under thirty, due to my having declared them political refugees during Operation Drug Addict.
“Caliente Base is online,” William said. Felt the whole room relax a little. “They can’t raise anyone at Dulce or Home Base either. They want to know if they should investigate.”
“No. Tell them we’ll be there shortly. I don’t want anyone going in until we have all areas cleared. Check the Dome. And every other base worldwide.”
“Yes, Ambassador.”
We waited. Couldn’t speak for anyone else, but I was certainly praying that the Dome, which was the main gate hub for the entire world, was secure and still in communication with us.
“The Dome and all bases worldwide other than Dulce and Home Base reporting in,” William said. “All bases on High Alert. Dome is locked down. All personnel have been told to wait for your order, Ambassador.”
“Why oh why is Kitty somehow in charge?” Christopher grumbled. “The power goes straight to her head.”
“With Alpha Team inaccessible, she and the Pontifex are the highest ranking individuals available,” William replied. Could’ve sworn that, despite the situation, he was trying not to laugh. At Christopher, I hoped.
While Jeff and Christopher both tried to look like they didn’t hate hearing that, and also tried not to look like they desperately wanted to go back to being the Heads of Field and Imageering, Gower cleared his throat. “Kitty, I need to talk to you, alone, just for a moment.”
“Sure, Paul.” We stepped out and went down the hall to Raj’s office. Gower closed the door. “Paul, if this is about ACE, I know.”
Gower looked shocked. “What do you mean you know?”
“Jeff, Chuckie and I know that ACE isn’t . . . around right now. We haven’t told anyone else, and we won’t tell anyone else. If ACE needs us for anything, we’ll all do whatever we need to, but we know ACE isn’t here to help us.”
Gower’s shoulders slumped and he sat down. “How long have you known?”
“Chuckie’s known the longest. Jeff and I found out at the start of Operation Sherlock.”
He heaved a sigh. “I wish I’d known you all knew. It’s been hard to pretend to talk to ACE without him inside me.”
“We think he’s still there, Paul. Per Jamie ACE is still . . . around somewhere.”
“I don’t feel him, and I haven’t since a few weeks after the invasion.”
“Right when the tunnels went back to impenetrable?”
“Yes, right then.” He rubbed his forehead. “We’re clearly under attack of some kind. Someone’s going to ask where ACE is and why he isn’t helping us.”
“Specifically why he’s not saving James.” Reader was Gower’s husband. ACE had helped save his life before, and if something bad had happened to Reader, we were going to have to deal with our enemies knowing ACE was gone at the same time as grieving our hearts out. Which sucked.
“Or Serene. Or anyone else. Such as everyone at Dulce and Home Base.”
“We’ll deal with it. I’ll spin it in some way, Paul, don’t worry. Chuckie and Jeff are ready to follow either one of our leads on what’s going on with ACE. The four of us will handle it. We can’t let ACE being on sabbatical stop us from figuring out what’s going on and saving our people right now.”
“I know.” Gower heaved another sigh and stood up. Shoulders squared, expression of calm confidence on his face—back to the religious leader of an entire exiled race. Good. We needed him on his A game. “I’m going to officially give you full control of the A-C population when we’re back with the others.”
“Super. Why?”
“Because I can’t give it to Jeff, or rather, Representative Martini. I can’t give it to Christopher, or rather, the husband of the woman fighting to control Gaultier Enterprises. And I can’t in good conscience give the reins to Chuck because he’s C.I.A. and we don’t want them running us, nor do we want the F.B.I. and Homeland Security demanding their fair share of us. So, you’re our leader.”
“Thanks for the vote of confidence, there, Paul.”
He grinned. “And besides, when the evil madmen plans arise, as I’m sure we’re facing right now, there’s no one better at the helm than Megalomaniac Girl.”
“Ah, you do love me and respect the skills.”
Gower laughed. “Kitty, when it comes to someone figuring out what the crazy people have going on, there’s no one who’s your equal.” He hugged me. “And, as James would say, you’ll always be our girl.”
I hugged him back. “So, does this mean you two are willing to go bi and add me into the marriage?”
“I think Jeff should be worried about how hopeful you just sounded.”
“I think I’m still waiting for your answer.”
CHAPTER 16
WE REJOINED THE OTHERS. “So, you’re still willing to be my wife?” Jeff asked, sarcasm turned to only about a six on the scale of ten.
“Since Paul insists that he and James aren’t ready to go bi yet, yeah.”
Gower shook his head with a laugh. “No matter what Kitty insinuates, she loves you best, Jeff.”
Jeff put his arm around me. “A man can hope, anyway. So, what’s the plan?”
Gower cleared his throat, all levity gone. “William, please send this through to all bases and facilities.”
“Ready, Pontifex Gower.”
“To all Centaurion Division and American Centaurion personnel, as Supreme Pontifex I’m declaring that, until we know the status of the majority of Alpha and all of Airborne Teams, and the status of Home Base and the Dulce Science Center, we are officially in a state of emergency. Full leadership will reside with our Ambassador and Head of the Diplomatic Corps, Kitty Katt-Martini, who will now be considered as acting as the Head of Alpha Team until the state of emergency is removed. Please obey her orders as you would anyone else from Alpha Team. Kitty, to you.”