Alien vs. Alien

way.” When I’d first met the Gang from A-C, Jeff had implanted something into me, which turned out to be a message from his late aunt. I’d only had an essence of a tiny bit of Terry within me, and ACE had removed that when we’d found him, but it had been enough.
    I’d seen ӀTerry give ten-year-old Jeff a glowing cube, telling him it was just for him and Christopher to use. It was part of the memory she’d programmed Jeff to implant, so my seeing the cube was intentional on Terry’s part.
    Since then I’d always wondered how it had worked, how she’d created it, because I’d never seen anything like it before or since. We had no idea, because the cube had been taken by a person or persons unknown sometime after the boys had used it. Jeff and I had hoped it was his parents who had found it, but they insisted they hadn’t.
    I now had a good idea of who had. “Clarence found the Power Cube, took it, and that’s what they used to find our invading friends.”
    “Most likely.” Christopher’s face had drained of color. “If they’ve used it, then they know everything Jeff and I can do.”

    Yi

CHAPTER 84

    “M AYBE THEY DO, BUT MAYBE THEY DON’T.”
    Shockingly, my fabulous words of wisdom and comfort didn’t seem to make Christopher feel any better.
    White went to his son, put his arm around Christopher’s shoulders, and brought him away from the screen. “Let’s sit down for a moment, son.”
    While White and Christopher took time to calm down and forestall freaking out, I considered the latest fun facts.
    Terry hadn’t been stupid, and she’d been very aware of what was going on. Based on the cube, she might have known more than any other A-C who wasn’t close to Yates. Plus, A-Cs were big on the fail-safes. I put my money on her installing something to protect her only son and nephew. Whether that had been broken or not was probably the issue. And the baddies had had over twenty years to try.
    Less, though, because LaRue was the real brains of this particular operation, especially now that Yates was a deader. The trophy wife, who’d only been around for about ten years or so. Still might have been enough time.
    I found myself wishing Madeline Cartwright were still alive. She’d been the brains behind the whole Titan Makes Scary Weapons stuff, and more besides, but she’d understood me and I’d understood her. We’d liked each other in that sense, once all the masks were off, even though we were enemies. I knew she’d known about this.
    So, had to think like she had. But not aloud. For once. First time for everything. But Cartwright had done all her work in secret. So, to think like she did, I couldn’t share.
    Normally not getting to think aloud would allow my mind to wander off topic. But I was honestly too mad and afraid to allow it. I couldn’t afford to wander until Jeff and Chuckie were back, and we had some handle on how to protect our world.
    What would Cartwright have done with the knowledge that there were hidden rooms all over the place? If they were rooms at all? I felt certain she’d have come to the same conclusion I had—that they’d been put into րplace long ago and well before the A-Cs had ever arrived.
    Like the rest of the Bad Guys League, Cartwright had wanted to live forever, and she wanted to be the one in charge. She wasn’t into the fame portion, but she was all about the power stuff. So, what do you do, when you know someone out there is more powerful than you and also not as nice as the people you’re used to dealing with?
    My brain kicked, and I jerked. “Marling and Cartwright made the supersoldiers and androids to fight the invaders. It’s not their only purpose, obviously, but that’s their double duty. Which means they have something in them that we can set off to make them react and fight for us, not against us.”
    “Then let’s hope James and Tim are successful,” Christopher said. “Because I don’t think we can fit the entire population of the planet into the Dome.”
    “The Dome . . .”
    “What?” White asked.
    “Big George, can we zoom over to New Mexico and take a look at one of the red circles?”
    “Sure.” The picture on the big screen changed. “You want Area Fifty-One?”
    It was circled in red, but that wasn’t my main focus. Yet. “No, the one over here.” I went to his terminal and pointed it out. “That’s the Crash Site Dome, where the Ancients crash-landed in the nineteen-fifties.”
    “It’s off