Alien Proliferation

bag they were looking in. “We’ve seen enough.”
    “More than enough,” White agreed.
    “I know I’m going to regret asking, but what’s in the bags?”
    “Exactly what you think is in the bags.” Chuckie really looked like he was going to throw up.
    “Erm . . . severed body parts from all the two hundred or so male hybrids who died mysteriously as well as a variety of our agents, probably the ones with empathic and imageering talents, including the four who were murdered earlier in Operation Confusion?”
    White nodded. “And this is why you’re my partner, Missis Martini. You continue to think like the megalomaniacs and psychos above all others.”
    “Damn. I was so hoping I’d be wrong, and the bags would be filled with candy or fluffy bunnies.”
    “Might not be all two hundred, but, there’s plenty of parts.” Chuckie shuddered. “Replicants. Oh, my God.”
    I pointed to the containers on the metal counter. “Master, Igor has found some lovely brains for you.”

 
    CHAPTER 81
     
    W E ALL STARED AT FRANKENSTEIN’S Crock-Pots. “You think it’s just their brains in there?” Chuckie asked hopefully.
    “No idea. I hope Jeff and Christopher can figure out how to lock this memory away so Jamie never, ever sees it.” Found myself wishing we had a Dazzler along. This all looked extremely scientific. Camilla might have had the stomach for it, but since I had no phone reception, I couldn’t call her down here to find out. “Any clue what’ll happen if we open things up?”
    “None.” Chuckie was studying the wires, and he began to follow the trail of vats. As before, each one was hooked into the next all the way down the line, to the far wall, where we turned the corner and moved farther into the Freezer from Hell. I started humming “Whatever Happened to Saturday Night” from Rocky Horror .
    “I still think you made the best Columbia ever,” Chuckie said as we moved along. More stainless steel counter on both sides, more creepy vats, all connected one to the next.
    “You’re so sweet. You did Brad really well, too.”
    “Nerd was natural, yeah.”
    “What are you two talking about, Missus Martini?”
    “Shared experiences at the midnight movies, Mister White. Long in the past now. Similarities to our current situation, however.” Wondered if a saxophone would be involved, figured it couldn’t possibly end up that enjoyable an experience. I didn’t luck into Tim Curry in a leather teddy and fishnet stockings. My luck ran to creepy fuglies and insane politicos. I consoled myself that I’d married the hottest alien in the galaxy. Just hoped I’d see him again soon.
    “I counted well over a hundred of the containers.” White said quietly. “And that was in the other room alone.”
    We turned again. Counters and vats continued on, but then stopped at another freezer door. “What are the odds?” Chuckie asked.
    “Oh, pretty freaking good. Clone army or Gaultier’s Monster?”
    “No bet. Could be either one, could be both.”
    “I’m getting a horrible feeling about what the two of you are talking about, Missus Martini. Should we be prepared for attack or merely for unmitigated horror?”
    “See, this is why you’re my new partner, Mister White.’Cause you continue to rock above all others. Cover all the bases, assume both.”
    Chuckie opened the door. Inside was a room lit up like the proverbial Christmas tree. And inside it was something that, even though I was prepared, made me scream.
    White hugged me to him and I buried my face in his chest. “Mister Reynolds, your thoughts? About what to do, I mean. I assume we’re all sharing the horror.”
    “The room’s rigged. I don’t think we can enter it safely.” I felt Chuckie’s hand on my back. “Kitty, you have to pull it together, right now.”
    I took a deep breath, pulled away from White, and turned around. Nope, I hadn’t imagined it. Sent a memo to the cosmos to clarify that when I’d thought about wanting to see Jeff again soon, I hadn’t meant like this.
    “Jeff” was standing there. There were tubes and wires going into “him.” “Christopher” and “Chuckie” were on either side of “Jeff” just as they’d been in the Paris dungeon. Tubes and wires in them, too. They were naked, and I could confirm that “Jeff” and “Chuckie” were anatomically correct.
    There were replicas of every one of the men from Alpha and Airborne in there. I did my best not to check them out. Failed. If