Alien vs. Alien

cleared by his higher-ups. I had to work on it in secret because Chuck didn’t want the other guys to know.”
    “Bastard,” Stryker muttered.
    “Why does Ravi get all the fun jobs?” Henry whined.
    “Who authorized that, do you know?” Armstrong asked, before the rest of the guys could whine and complain.
    “I can check if it’s important.”
    “It is.”
    “What’re you thinking, Senator?”
    “It’ll depend on who gave Reynolds the release.”
    Ravi typed away. I noted he was using both hands. “Ravi, your head hasn’t exploded.”
    “No. I was able to reverse the tracker, with help from the good people at the Science Center. It wonnce ling /font>
    “Who said I was panicking?”
    “I know you. Anyway, while doing this I was also able to remove the kill switch. I’ve tried to track Chuck, but it’s like everything else, the signal’s not clear enough to be sure where he is. On the other hand, your team in Paraguay is, as we speak, taking control of the supersoldiers and pseudosuperbeings, just as the team in Paris is.”
    “How did you figure this out?” Christopher asked. “You didn’t have one of the ‘fake’ superbeings to work with.”
    “Their signal signatures are similar to the one Chuck brought me. There are minor variations per supersoldier, of course, but frankly, the differences are more pronounced per ‘batch’ than per supersoldier.”
    “I was told . . . by someone who would know, that the supersoldiers Chuckie has under his control are different from all the others.”
    “Yes, their signals are indeed different. Stronger. I can’t speak for anything else about them other than the signal they send. It’s different, but not that different, if you will.”
    “Awesome. So, this is good news. Right?”
    “Right.”
    “How many are there, can you tell?”
    “Yes. Based on the signatures I can identify, we have at least a thousand.”
    That sat on the air for a longer bit. “Wow. That’s, um, a lot.”
    “Only if they can fight the invaders,” Franklin said. “Otherwise, ten thousand honestly wouldn’t be that many.”
    I’d seen these things in action, Franklin hadn’t. “Trust me, that’s a lot. Good lord, do they have some factory or something?”
    “Want my hypothesis?” Ravi asked.
    “Sure.”
    “I believe the dead zones function as sections of a factory.”
    Henry snorted. “Too far apart to be useful.”
    “Oh, I don’t know,” Omega Red said. “It’s quite possible. They do it with cars all the time.”
    “It’s unwieldy,” Big George shared, backing the Dr. Wu Team.
    “How does this get Jeff and Reynolds back?” Christopher asked before Hacker International could go into a full-fledged, completely off-tangent discussion that would turn into a shouting match followed by a group sulk, none of which we had time to indulge, even though it tended to be worth the price of admission.
    They were all quiet for a moment while Christopher treated everyone to Patented Glare #4. “It doesn’t,” Ravi said finally. “Sorry.” He cleared his throat, ensuring the epidemic would continue. “Senator, just found it—Clifford Goodman from Homeland Security authorized the release.”
    “That’s good, right? Cliff’s a friend of Chuckie’s.”
    Armstrong nodded slowly. “ 뀀I think so.”
    “Interesting,” Stryker said. “I’ve been looking at the C.I.A. files Big George found on all of you. Not sure what your teams are going to come up with, but this section seems key for what’s going on. ‘Team works well together. Separately they are much less effective. Separation of Katt-Martini from the rest of the team causes faster degeneration of effectiveness.’”
    “Who wrote that report?” Buchanan asked.
    Stryker shook his head. “It’s been added to, by a variety of operatives, all of whom are using code names. It’ll take time to decipher and use resources we have focused elsewhere.”
    “Really?”
    “Really. You’ve used up all our servers and focus, Kitty, including the ones your folks added. If you want me to put resources here, you have to choose what other vital search or program you want stopped.”
    “Who added that information doesn’t matter,” Christopher said. “It proves why they spent so much effort getting Kitty away from the rest of us.”
    “I think they’re selling your team short,” Franklin said.
    “Depends on who put that information in.” I looked at Armstrong. “Senator, you and I discussed