Alien vs. Alien

that was close.”
    I backed us away, keeping them behind me, as the supersoldier took another hit and went onto its, for want of a better word, knees. It fell over onto its face and more people.
    Heard more than felt something. A little sound that I shouldn’t have been able to hear at all. A sigh, almost.
    Looked at the mother and daughter with me. I still had hold of the woman’s arm. But half of her was gone. And so was half of her daughter. They’d been sliced through by laser fire. I’d put them behind me to protect them, but that act had killed them.
    Horror, despair, and rage vied for supremacy. Horror and despair really had the most going for them. But as I forced my fingers to let go of the woman’s arm and watched what was left of their bodies fall to the ground, rage won.
    These invaders didn’t even have the decency to come fight us one on one. I might have no love for the beings from Alpha Centauri who had sided with King Adolphus and come here to destroy me and my friends, but they’d had the balls to face us on a reasonably fair field of battle.
    But these invaders had come and started shooting at us, at innocent people. There was a word for what they were. In one way or another, I’d been fighting against what they were since the first minutes I’d joined up with Centaurion Division.
    They were terrorists. And they had to be stopped. Because everyone who died today deserved for their survivors to live free. And I was going to make sure that happened.
    Or die trying.

    Yi

CHAPTER 96

    S OMEONE GRABBED ME, AND I JUMPED. “Come on, baby,” Jeff said. “Let’s get this stopped before more innocent people get . . . hurt.”
    “How’d you find me?”
    “I read your mind. Kitty, just remember . . . this isn’t your fault. You didn’t bring these beings down on us. They brought themselves. Now let’s go stop them. Permanently.”
    I nodded. I wasn’t sure I believed him, but I was sure that we needed to stop the madness. We headed for the Lincoln Mtfemorial again.
    I’d planned to head for the area Clarence had been when he’d tried to lure the Gower girls to the dark side. But Christopher was at the base of the steps leading up to the Memorial, and we joined him there.
    It didn’t take long to figure out why Christopher had stopped here. Clarence was here on the steps of the Memorial—and he wasn’t alone. He had Jamie in his arms and a gun at her head. “Come any closer and I kill her,” Clarence shouted.
    We stopped. “How did he get her?” Jeff asked. “I thought she was safe.”
    “No idea.” My throat was tight. I wanted to run and grab her out of his arms, but I knew that would just mean he shot my baby in front of me. “I shouldn’t have left her alone at the Dome.”
    “She wasn’t alone,” Christopher said, voice filled with dread. He didn’t have to voice his thoughts—if Clarence had Jamie, what had happened to everyone else at the Dome? What had happened to ACE?
    Agents were bringing people, and they headed for us. Jeff and Christopher both put their hands up, and everyone stopped. Just in time.
    Light beamed down out of the sky, coming from the flying saucer closest to us. Just like in the movies. I could see bodies coming down inside the light. Several of them.
    The light disappeared, and there were five beings with Clarence. We knew two of them—Ronaldo Al Dejahl and LaRue Demorte Gaultier.
    Al Dejahl didn’t have an image overlay on, so he looked like himself—tall, midtwenties, handsome, well built, dark hair and eyes. Since I wasn’t fighting for my life at the moment, I could spot the resemblance to White easily, and Serene as well.
    The woman with him I also knew, but not in the same way. She was a tall, thin, bleached blonde about my age, maybe a little older, but not much. The Trophy Wife, aka LaRue Demorte Gaultier. I’d met her a few times, both before Amy’s mother had died—when she’d been Herbert Gaultier’s assistant—and after, when she’d become his second wife. I’d never liked her then, which was nice, because I certainly loathed her now.
    They were both dressed in what I could only think of as an intergalactic robe and muumuu combination. The fabric sort of hung off their shoulders like drapes, which hid their body shapes. The robes had loose sleeves that went down to their wrists. I got the impression that if they’d held their arms straight out to their sides, they’d look like half of a white balloon each.
    Of course,