Alien vs. Alien

without an A-C to hold onto and to help control my direction as well as my ability to stop, I had the potential to slam
through
walls as well. I preferred not to, so did my best to keep the hyperspeed turned to “off.”
    Arrived to find everyone where I’d expected—in the kitchen, hanging out and filching foodstuffs to tide them over between this morning’s humongous breakfast and the upcoming huge lunch.
    I snagged a brownie that had, by its temperature, just come out of the oven five minutes ago. “We have a big problem.”
    Of course we—me, my baby daughter, Jamie, Amy, Len, Kyle, and Former Pontifex Richard White—were already in Florida because of a problem. I took said problem out of White’s arms and gave her a cuddle.
    Jamie was half human, half alien, with me supplying the human side and Jeff supplying the alien or A-C side. Problem was, due to the many internal differences between humans and A-Cs, some things went much faster in child development.
    In Jamie’s case, while we’d controlled her hyperspeeding well, and Jeff and his cousin, Christopher White, had implanted empathic and imageering blocks into her when she was a newborn, there was nothing anyone could do for her when her teeth came in. All at once.
    Jamie had been in agony, and even in isolation, even with every block he had available to him set to eleven on a scale of ten, Jeff, the strongest empath in, most likely, the galaxy, hadn’t been able to stand it. His baby daughter was in agony, and he not only couldn’t help her, he could feel every bit of her pain. And it hurt him in ways I couldn’t even comprehend.
    That “fun” had gone on for three days. Then, to save everyone’s sanity, preserve our marriage and Jeff’s health, and ensure that at least some of us were still able to function in our roles as the current and very novice American Centaurion Diplomatic C C Di leorps, I’d packed up my miserable baby and taken her to the one place everyone could feel at least reasonably okay about, which was to Jeff’s parents, Alfred and Lucinda.
    They’d had to deal with Jeff’s empathic talents at birth, so their house was set up for it. They were A-Cs, so they could keep Jamie’s hyperspeed in check, and my parents, though awesome grandparents, were both working and human. Plus, as Lucinda had pointed out when I’d called her desperately and somewhat hysterically at 3 a.m. a month ago, my parents saw Jamie all the time, since they’d moved to D.C. to be nearer to us.
    “Catsuit time, Missus Martini?” White asked.
    “Unfortunately no. But a problem of epic proportions is descending on us.”
    “Oh, Kitty,” Lucinda said with a chuckle. “You’re always so dramatic.”
    “In this case, we really have the drama. Senator Armstrong is going to be here in less than thirty minutes.”
    “How lovely that he’s visiting. I’ll set another place for lunch,” Lucinda said as she headed for the dining room. My mother-in-law, despite all the evidence to the contrary, seemed to think that most politicians had everyone’s best interests at heart.
    I heaved a sigh. “Richard, could you please explain to your sister why this isn’t quite the social call we’d like?”
    “I live to serve. However, I’m sure all of us are more than capable of dealing with the senator. You excel at the diplomatic touch, after all.” White trailed after Lucinda.
    I managed not to snort. I excelled at certain forms of diplomacy. If it came to dealing with interstellar invaders, I was the go-to girl. When it came to regular politics, however, I was still whiffing a lot more than scoring.
    “Great.” I appealed to Alfred. “Any way we can pretend to have a big fire or something?”
    He laughed. “No, I don’t think that’s a good idea. But I’m sure you’re worried for nothing.” Alfred and Jeff really proved the adage “like father, like son” to be true, from their looks and body build right down to their expressions. I was getting the “you’re cute, so I don’t mind indulging your little whims” look. It was a nice look, but it didn’t say “I’m ready to play dangerous word games with the nasty man.” And it made me miss Jeff even more than I already did, which did nothing to improve my mood.
    Amy snorted. “Right. I stopped thinking Kitty was worried about nothing four and a half months ago.”
    “Senator Armstrong tried to kill Kitty six weeks ago,” Len supplied.
    Honesty forced me to correct him. “No,