Alien vs. Alien

hallucinations for the majority of humans that the A-C field teams were able to manipulate. The Field teams needed implants in their brains to do the manipulations. Abigail didn’t.
    Naomi’s talents were more like her eldest brother’s, dream and memory reading, but greatly expanded. Naomi could also alter dreams and memories. The girls tended to work together as a team, and they were the C.I.A.’s main test subjects for what hybrids could do now and might do in the future, so they spent a lot of time with Chuckie.
    That the Gower girls hadn’t conspired to take over the world, or destroy it, had much to do with ACE. ACE was a collective superconsciousness I’d managed to move into Paul Gower during Operation Drug Addict. But even before that incident, ACE had helped the Gower girls to control their powers when they were young, and now he was doing it with all the new babies, Jamie in particular.
    The Gower girls took one look at Chuckie and sighed. “You were right to call us over,” Naomi said as she went and sat next to Chuckie. “You need to relax, mister,” she said with a grin.
    He managed a smile. “Right. Let me tell you about our day so far, and then you can tell me to take it easy.”
    Abigail chuckled. “Let’s get him calmed down, Sis. Our boy’s all riled up.” Of course, it took A-Cs with special talents or people who’d known Chuckie a long, long time to tell that he was upset, but for everyone in this room, it was obvious. Abigail smiled at Jeff and me. “We’ll say ‘great to see you’ when you two get back.”
    Jeff and I knew when to take a hint, so we headed to our apartments, which took up half otoo”f the seventh floor and were larger than the house I’d grown up in. But I was getting used to living in them and had missed the privacy while in Florida.
    Before we were through the door, I was greeted by a tide of canines. My parents had moved to D.C. right before Operation Assassination had rolled, and they were in a no-pets building. This meant that we now claimed ownership of four dogs and three cats. The pets seemed to be okay with their permanent vacation.
    The dogs having proved they’d missed me and Jamie and loved us best, I trooped into our bedroom to the welcoming sounds of loud, demanding mewing mixed with equally loud purring. The cats were lounging on the deluxe cat trees I called Poof Condos, surrounded by a whole pride of Poofs. I gave up on the idea that Jeff and I could get some quality naked time in the next few minutes and focused on the fur balls.
    The Poofs had been our parting gifts from the Alpha Centaurion Royal Family during our wedding, aka Operation Invasion. They were small bundles of fluffy fur, with cat ears, bright, button eyes, and tiny paws. Poofs were basically the cutest things in existence. They also had the ability to go Jeff-sized and very toothy, so they were great personal protection providers.
    They were also androgynous and could mate with any other Poof. They mated when Royal Weddings were afoot. We had a lot more Poofs than our wedding or Christopher and Amy’s would have warranted, but I didn’t mind. Poofs for everyone and more Poofs for me was one of the mottos I lived by.
    In the Poof’s world, if you named it, you owned it. We had the unnamed Poofs living with us, so while I was gone, Jeff had gotten to enjoy all the Poofy wonder by himself. I was envious—I’d missed all the pets, the Poofs in particular.
    For whatever reason, the Poofs hadn’t come down to Florida with us. They had a lot of powers no one understood, among them the ability to go wherever and whenever they wanted. But none had wanted to visit Florida, not even the Poof that was obviously Jamie’s. I’d tried to bring them along, but they’d done a runner and come back to D.C. before we’d been at Martini Manor an hour.
    However, Jamie’s Poof was in her arms now, snuggling and purring up a storm, while she giggled and cooed. Two Poofs alighted on my shoulders. “Harlie, Poofikins! Kitty’s missed you so much!”
    I got a lot of Poof purrs and rubs. The cats deigned to take an active interest beyond yowling at me for my desertion and jumped onto the bed, mewing and purring.
    “I was hoping to be the first one you cuddled with in bed,” Jeff said, “but clearly the animals missed you two as much as I did.
    “Sorry.”
    “It’s okay. I’ll bide my time. So cuddle with the cats,baby. I know you want to, and so does Jamie.”
    Thusly encouraged,