Alien Tango

which was saying a lot. “And this isn’t going to go over well with the American government, let alone in other countries.”
    I thought about it. “It’s worse. It’s going to make Centaurion Division seem less like a positive. And the less positive you seem, the more the pressure there will be to turn you into a military division that’s fighting other countries.”
    “What in God’s name are we going to do?” Christopher asked quietly.
    “Jeff, what did you mean by a female being able to neutralize the entities?”
    “Let’s just ask the source,” he said. I turned and saw Alfred and the rest of our group joining us. “Sure it’s safe to have Kitty, Lorraine, and Claudia all here?” Martini’s voice was dripping with both sarcasm and fury.
    Alfred shook his head. “We didn’t think of it. We were establishing ourselves with the ranking superpower and protecting our new home from a terrible threat. Forgive us for not being as on top of things as your generation.”
    Oh, the Martini men could both twist the sarcasm knob up to full. “Um, guys? Really, let’s focus. What’s the right thing to do in this situation, Alfred?”
    He shrugged. “I have no idea. It was my grandparents’ generation who put up the Physic-Psycho Barrier around Beta Twelve.”
    “Beta Twelve?”
    Alfred chuckled. “We assigned each planet a sequence based on which sun they were closest to and where they were in order. There are eighteen planets in our system, ten are inhabited. The others might be now, but they weren’t inhabited when we were exiled.”
    “But you should only have eight at the most,” Chee said. “At least, according to our calculations.”
    Alfred shrugged. “Your calculations are wrong, and, due to a variety of good reasons, none of us have mentioned that until now. I know, the idea is that the second sun would cause orbital disruptions. But our planets have lemniscate orbits.”
    “You mean the planets make a figure eight?” This seemed unreal to me, but then again, so did hyperspeed, and they did it all the time.
    “Yes,” Alfred nodded. “Exactly. But only some of them. There are specific reasons for it, the metals at our worlds’ cores for starters, but really, now is not the time. Alphas One through Three are uninhabited, Alpha Four is our home world, and Alphas Five through Eight are also inhabited. Betas start with Nine, and Nine through Eleven are uninhabited. Twelve through Sixteen are inhabited, Betas Seventeen and Eighteen are not. Beta Twelve is the problem planet.”
    “And the net thingy?” I couldn’t come up with that word again on my own.
    “Physic-Psycho Barrier. It’s referred to as a PPB.”
    “What does it mean?”
    “Physical and psychological barrier,” Alfred explained, only somewhat patiently. “It works like a net.”
    “Looking for both a physical and a psychological presence?”
    “Hence the name.” I marveled at how Martini’s father could get the exact same amount of frustration into his tone as his son.
    I looked up at said son. “Ergo, why our unmanned craft have gotten through—computer brains are not the same as human ones. And the entities are looking for both the physical and mental presences of those they saw before. They’re drawing their pictures for the astronauts in the hopes said astronauts will show them where their penguins went.”
    “Penguins?” Martini looked confused. “How did we get onto flightless waterfowl?”
    Oh, right, he’d been on the phone. “You explain it to them,” I said to Gower. I went over to Michael’s cell. “Have you cross-referenced?”
    He nodded. “I’ve compared every person that came by without speaking to the archives. All had been in space before, and all are dead.”
    “Do you still see them out there?”
    He looked. “No.” He looked back at me. “They disappeared as I verified they were dead. But they might come back.”
    “No, they won’t. I’m going to get you out of here soon, Michael, I promise.”
    “Thanks.” He gave me a very seductive smile. “So, have you and Jeff declared for each other yet?”
    This was a new one. “No, not that I know of. What does that mean?”
    Michael shrugged. “It’s how we A-C’s begin the commitment process. We declare for each other. It puts both parties off the market—bad form to try to break up a declared couple.”
    Interesting. Martini had never mentioned this. Ever. “Nice custom.”
    “And until you’ve declared, you’re