Universal Alien (9 page)

T
HE FIRST NURSES WE SAW
at Walter Reed didn't like my head injury, but they felt it looked worse than it was. Once they cleaned me up it was decided that I didn't need stitches, and by the time the RN who was doing my pre-check for the doctor came in to see us, Chuckie was pointedly asked why I was even here.

When Dr. Zainal arrived he recognized me, but I was greeted as an old friend, not as someone he sort of knew. Dr. Zainal didn't mentioned aliens, Jeff, the Bahraini diplomatic mission, or anything else I'd have thought he would. He did ask how we'd enjoyed Australia and said he was glad we were back early, despite the circumstances. Just added this onto the Weirdness of the Day column and didn't even remark on it.

My head still hurt, but not like it had. Chuckie was clearly freaked out by my rapid improvement, but he just told Dr. Zainal about the car accident and the doctor seemed forgiving of my taking up his time, in part because the kids needed to be checked out, too.

The kids were checked first, and all declared fine and just shaken up. Then it was my turn. “The chart says that Katherine's head was cut open when she arrived,” Dr. Zainal said. “How did you receive your injury, Katherine?” he asked. “I would have thought the airbags in your car would have caused a different injury, depending on where your hands were on the steering wheel.”

“The airbags never deployed.”

Chuckie stiffened. “What? Are you sure?”

“I'm freaking positive.”

“Mommy's forehead hit the steering wheel,” Charlie offered helpfully. “Then her head went back, but she didn't really hit the seat.”

“And no bags opened anywhere,” Max added.

“But it's the back of her head where the injury was,” Chuckie said.

“Interesting,” Dr. Zainal said. “As I examine her, I see nothing. However, the amount of blood on the back of her head and on her clothing is consistent with a more severe head injury than she appears to have.”

“I'm a fast healer.”

Dr. Zainal gave me the “really?” look. “Not in my experience,” he said. “Not like this. However, even though there is no actual external injury we can see, the risk of a severe concussion is still there. If the hematoma doesn't go out—and you have no bump forming—then it tends to go in, and press upon the brain.”

“Would that explain why Kitty has memory loss and confusion?” Chuckie asked, sounding almost desperate.

Dr. Zainal nodded. “Yes, very likely. We still know so little about what affects the brain, but a trauma such as what you described could cause many issues. But let's see what we have otherwise.” A variety of tests were performed, and as far as I could tell, I passed them all.

The doctor shook his head. “Her reflexes are excellent, her eyes display no signs of concussion, and she displays no other signs of trauma or even injury.”

“I told you, I'm a fast healer.”

“Apparently so.” But he didn't ask any more questions. At least of me. He pulled Chuckie aside and they spoke quietly. If I was still fully human, I wouldn't have been able to hear them. But A-Cs have enhanced hearing, so these days I did as well, and I could hear them easily.

“She needs an MRI,” Dr. Zainal. “For starters. Potentially many other tests, especially if the MRI isn't definitive. I've never seen anything like this.”

“She looked much worse when I got to them,” Chuckie said. “I was amazed she was upright, but I just figured it was adrenaline rush.”

“Maybe, but the rapid healing . . . I have no idea what could have caused that. It's a good thing, a miracle, at least it seems so, but until we study her more, I have no guess for what's truly going on.”

Aside from the fact that they were discussing my healthcare without consulting or including me, it occurred to me that I didn't want any regular hospital having a sample of my blood or tissue or anything. The less known about my improved physical makeup the better.

“I just want to go home,” I said, before Chuckie could agree to anything. “Now. Please. The kids and I need to get home and regroup.”

Dr. Zainal shook his head. “Katherine, you may have a severe concussion and we should probably do an MRI.”

“No. I want to go home. Immediately if not sooner. I will not allow you to perpetrate any more medical procedures on me. Or the kids.” They didn't need to discover that Jamie was also extra with a nice side of special, either. “Let's go, Chuckie. Now.”

Chuckie stared at me. “Ah, okay,” he said.

Dr. Zainal clearly didn't approve, but he stopped arguing. “Call me, day or night, if anyone feels worse. And a visit to your chiropractor would be a wise choice for the children. Katherine probably needs a visit as well, but I'm concerned about manipulation affecting her concussion negatively.”

“Gotcha, we'll be cautious.”

Both men stared at me, but we were allowed to leave. Of course, it took longer than anyone wanted to get released, but we managed it. Chuckie also managed to fit in a phone call to someone that he thought I didn't know he'd made. I could hear most of his side of the conversation and it consisted of a fast, high-level recap of everything that had happened and everything I'd said or done. My strong suspicion was that the person on the other end of the call was Reader.

“Please stop calling me Chuckie outside of the bedroom, Kitty,” he said quietly as we were finally heading toward the car. “It makes me really uncomfortable when you call me that in front of the kids.”

Decided to not complain about this. Everything was weird, odd, or suspicious, why not this, too? “What would you prefer then? Chuck?”

“No. What you've called me for the past many years, baby—Charles.”

“Check. Charles it is.”

He sighed but said nothing else, got the kids into the car and tucked me in as well, then we headed off.

The car ride wasn't filled with an overabundance of chat. Chuckie seemed worried and a little preoccupied. The kids were quiet, though I could hear Max grumbling that no one ever listened to him about anything. And I didn't feel like talking, since the answers I gave and got didn't make me or anyone else feel any better about anything.

Apparently we hadn't been that far from wherever we lived when we'd been run off the road, as we got off at the same highway exit we'd gotten on at earlier. We turned off the main street quickly and pulled into a lovely neighborhood with mature landscaping and nice, large homes. Was fairly sure this was the Colonial Village area, but wasn't positive. I was used to living in A-C facilities and they were gigantic, but these homes were still probably double the size of the house I'd grown up in.

Which reminded me. “Have you called my mom yet?”

Chuckie's hands tightened on the steering wheel. “Let's get home first, okay?”

We pulled up to a large house with a five-car garage. “This is a pretty house.”

“Glad you still like it, since you picked it out.” One of the garage doors opened and we drove in. “You wait in the car while I get the kids out.”

As he got out of the car, a man came into the garage from, I assumed, inside the house. It was a man I knew. He rushed to my door and opened it. “Kitty, darling, what did Doctor Zainal say? Are you and our precious little ones alright?”

“Pierre! It's so good to see you! Can you explain—”

“Pierre? Why are we speaking French?” He sounded genuinely confused as he started to help me out of the car.

“I'll do that, Peter, please. And like I told you, she hit her head,” Chuckie said, as the boys crowded near Pierre and Chuckie got Jamie out of the car. “Hard. Doctor Zainal says the amount of blood he saw on the back of her head and clothes indicates that Kitty's lucky she didn't crack her head wide open. However, nothing seems wrong externally now. But she needs rest and to be watched for signs of major concussion.”

Pierre cocked his head at me. “How did you hurt the back of your head if you were in a car accident? And if there was so much blood—and I can see that there was by the horrid state of these clothes—why don't you have stitches?”

“These are question no one's going to like my answer for—I was at the football stadium, watching a cricket game, and I fell onto the steps. After I caused Jeff to spill coffee on everyone. And I have faster regeneration than regular people.”

Pierre stared at me. “Who's Jeff?” As I looked at him I noticed he looked a little different than he had when I'd left this morning. Like Chuckie, his hair was slightly different, and he wasn't in the Armani Fatigues. He was dressed fashionably, but not formally.

“That's the question of the day,” Chuckie said as he handed Jamie to Pierre and carefully helped me out of the car. “I'm fairly sure she's gotten our
Traveler
game mixed up in her mind with reality.”

“Ah, interesting.”

“Is it?” I asked. “Can we call my mother now?”

Pierre and the kids stared at me. All of them looked upset.

Chuckie sighed as he helped me into the house. “Kitty . . . I'm sorry, but . . .”

“But what? What's wrong? Did Mom get hurt? Is Dad okay?” Maybe whoever was after me and the kids had been trying to get to or hurt my mother.

Chuckie put his arm around me and led me into what appeared to be the living room. “Kitty . . . baby, I'm so sorry that I have to tell you this, again, but . . .” He hugged me and kissed my forehead gently. “Your mother has been dead since Jamie was six months old.”

M
OM WAS DEAD?
This did not compute. At all. “There's no way! I just saw her last night! Is this some weird covert op?”

“No,” Chuckie said gently. “I wish it was.”

“Look, my mother is the head of the P.T.C.U. If she was dead, wouldn't the President have a problem with that?”

“P.T.C.U.?” Chuckie asked. He was clearly asking for everyone else in the room.

“Presidential Terrorism Control Unit. She's the head of it.”

“Ah. There's no such unit, Kitty.”

“Look, I realize that it's extremely covert. I mean, I didn't find out about it until I was freaking twenty-seven and discovered aliens were on the planet. But is now the time to pretend? Surely the kids are aware of what you do and I did for a living.”

“Daddy works for a think tank, but only 'cause Papa Sol thinks he needs to make his mind available,” Charlie said. Clearly he'd heard this a lot.

“How do we afford this house?”

“Charles made his money in convenience stores and then in the stock market,” Pierre said. “As you proudly tell anyone who asks. You're multi-millionaires many times over, as the bank cheerfully tells me every time I pay our bills.”

“Okay. What do you all think I do for a living?”

“You don't work, Mommy,” Charlie replied. “You take care of us.”

“She homeschools us,” Max added. “Our real mommy, I mean.”

“I told you to stop that, Maxwell,” Chuckie said sternly.

“Uncle Peter, did Mommy go change clothes before we left this morning?” Max asked.

“Ahh . . .” Pierre looked as if he wished he'd been briefed on whatever story he was supposed to tell.

“She forgot our music and went back into the house after Daddy and Uncle James left,” Charlie added.

“That makes sense.” Now Pierre looked relieved. “I was on the phone dealing with the worst customer service in the world, so elephants could have gone in and out and I wouldn't have noticed. Speaking of which . . .” He took my jacket and made the tsking sound that indicated he felt this item was probably beyond repair.

“That's it, then,” Chuckie said to Max. “Mommy decided to change to look nicer for Auntie Caro and that's why she's in different clothes than she was in at breakfast. Speaking of whom . . . Peter, did you reach Caroline?” He helped me sit down on a very lovely sofa. Had to admit, I liked the décor. Didn't mention it because I had a feeling everyone would tell me I liked it because I'd picked it out.

“Yes, she went to get Sol from the airport. She took a cab there and she'll drive them both back here.”

“Why would Caro have to get my dad from anywhere, let alone the airport?”

Both men gave me the look I was becoming familiar with—the “oh dear, it's worse than I thought” look. Pierre cleared this throat. “Ah, your father went to meet up with your Aunt Carla during her layover today.”

“Why?”

“Ah, so none of the rest of us would have to see her.”

“Well, that makes sense. So, Aunt Carla's alive, well, and exactly the same as I remember, but you insist that my mother, her younger sister, is dead?”

Peter nodded sadly. Chuckie, meanwhile, was on his phone. “Caroline, hi. Are you with Sol? Great. Is Carla gone? Oh. Wonderful.” He didn't sound like it was truly wonderful, which boded in the Aunt Carla department. “Well, the car's totaled but they're all amazingly okay. Kitty's hit her head, though, and is having some, ah, memory issues. You're going to need to prep Sol, and probably Carla, too, I'm sorry.” Aunt Carla department confirmed. “Yes. Ah, she remembers who you and I are, but, ah . . . yeah. She thinks she's married to an alien.” He swallowed. “And until a couple of minutes ago, she thought Angela was still alive.”

“I don't believe she's dead yet. I only believe that you've all
told
me she's dead.”

“Yeah, you heard that right. Please. Thanks, see you soon. Drive safely, and I really mean that.” He hung up and sat down next to me. “Caroline's got your dad and they're on their way here, baby. It'll all be okay, I promise.”

“Aunt Carla's along for the ride, too, isn't she?”

“Yes.” He said this with absolutely no enthusiasm.

“Truly, I cannot wait.” Leaned against Chuckie. “I don't understand what's going on.”

He put his arm around me and held me close. “I know. We'll get it taken care of.”

“I want to know who's trying to kill us. Because in addition to the airbags not going off—meaning that car was tampered with—the people who ran us off the road had machine guns that they used on the car in a clear attempt to finish the job they started. And I didn't recognize any of them.”

“Why would you recognize crazed killers?” Chuckie asked, sounding as if this was potentially the craziest thing I'd said so far.

“Um, by now I have a long history with hit men and women. Some who don't like us, most of whom are very dead now, and some who do. Speaking of whom, we should probably contact my ‘uncles,' Peter the Dingo Dog and Surly Vic.”

“Why are you calling Uncle Peter a dog?” Charlie asked.

“I'm not. Different Peter.”

Chuckie put his finger to my lips. “Kitty, you need to stop, baby. You're babbling and you're frightening the children.”

“Not just the children,” Pierre said quietly. He was texting. “Kitty, darling, we don't associate with paid killers.”

“They prefer to be called assassins. And yeah, actually, we do.”

Pierre's phone beeped. “James is on his way. He should arrive when Caroline and Sol do, if not before.”

“Fine. Look, the car was clearly tampered with. Assassins went out of their way to kill us. First by trying to drive us into a head-on collision, then by actually driving us off the road, and then by shooting us and blowing our car up. I'd sincerely like someone to take this seriously and stop acting like I'm crazed or concussed.”

“Let me worry about that,” Chuckie said.

“Not just no but hell no. People tried to kill me and these children today. As far as I'm concerned, that makes it totally my worry. I'm used to people trying to kill me on a regular basis, but it never stops being annoying.”

The “oh dear” looks were on everyone's faces. “Mommy,” Charlie said, “no one ever tries to kill us.”

Jamie nodded her agreement. “
We've
never gone through this, Mommy.” Again, everyone looked shocked. And again, there was something in the way she said this—something off. I needed to figure out what was going on with her and I needed to do it soon.

“She's not our mommy,” Max said, stomping his foot. Just like I did when it got to be too much and no one was paying attention to the obvious. “Listen to her! She talks wrong, just a little, but it's wrong. She looks wrong, just a little, but it's still wrong. Daddy said that's her wedding ring, but it's
not
. It's just a little different, but it's still wrong. She knows she's not our mommy.”

“She
is
,” Jamie said strongly.

“She
isn't
,” Max retorted. “Ask her who she thinks she is.”

Chuckie opened his mouth, probably to tell Max to behave, but I put my hand up. “Until I believe it, stop telling Max he's being inappropriate. Because right now I feel like he's the only one listening to me.”

Chuckie took my hand and looked at the wedding set more closely. “Max is right,” he said slowly. “This isn't the set I bought for you. It's close, but not quite the same. Where did you get this?” He sounded jealous and suspicious again.

“From my husband. My actual husband.”

“Tell them,” Max pleaded. “Tell them who
you
think you are.”

“I
know
I'm Katherine Sarah Katt, only I'm married to a man named Jeff Martini. He's an alien from Alpha Four of the Alpha Centaurion solar system. The positives are that they're here to protect and serve, and have given us a tremendous amount of technology. Oh, and they're all, every one of them, drop-dead gorgeous. And they think brains and brain capacity is the be-all, end-all, and, lucky us, they therefore feel that humans are da bomb, which is kind of a super bonus.”

“Kitty,” Chuckie said patiently, “there are no aliens on the planet. It's a hoax. I'm sure they're out there, somewhere, but they're not here.”

“Yes, actually they are. Aliens have been on the planet, en masse, since the nineteen-sixties. You, Chu—, ah, Charles, are part of the C.I.A. As I told you earlier, you head their Extra-Terrestrial Division. This has made you a target because we have a lot of enemies and you protect us. You were recruited by my mother.”

“Your mother wasn't in the C.I.A.” He was lying. Again, I could tell, but the unsettling thing was that this was, so far, the only thing he was lying about.

“She is or was, and my father is a cryptologist for NASA, specializing in alien languages.”

“Sol is a history professor.”

“Yes, but that's his cover. We aren't married because I thought you were joking when you proposed in Las Vegas and I found out you weren't after I'd already met and fallen in love with Jeff. You've been married, to a half-alien named Naomi. She died due to one of the many megalomaniacs that are constantly trying to destroy the A-Cs and take control of our world.”

“I don't know anyone named Naomi,” Chuckie said gently. “I've told you many times—I've never cheated on you, Kitty. Is that what this is all about? That old fight about why I'm occasionally gone for long periods where you can't reach me?”

“No, because I know nothing
of
that old fight. Let's move on, but I'll be happy to revisit that later. James is the Head of Field for Centaurion Division, the military branch of American Centaurion, which is the principality or whatever all the aliens fall under. He, like me, killed a parasitic superbeing—basically an alien monster—which was our introduction to our new supersecret lives. Following me so far?”

“Not at all,” Peter said. “I mean, I can't speak for anyone else, Kitty darling, but this sounds like you're trying to pitch a new TV series for the CW.”

Heard a step and turned to see Reader enter the room. “I'm following it,” Reader said. “At least, I think I am.”

“How long have you been here?” Chuckie asked. He didn't sound angry. He sounded like he was verifying that Reader had been backing him up.

Reader shrugged and passed one of those little signs to Chuckie. “Long enough.” Chuckie looked relieved, but only for a fleeting moment. I only saw this exchange because I was pointedly looking for it. “Based on what you and Peter have told me, something's very off, more than a concussion or the confusion of the
Traveler
game and real life. Based on what I just heard Kitty say, she has an entire life that she feels she's lived that is completely different than the one we know of.”

“And whoever you think I am, she has no knowledge that the two of you are in the C.I.A., or similar, does she?”