Touched by an Alien

back to the transient section. I was still freaked that he might think I hated him, and besides, holding him felt good.
    We didn’t get too far, however, when one of the many A-Cs I couldn’t place came racing up. The Armani fatigues and general hunkiness made them all look alike after a while. “Jeff, we have a situation.”
    “Unless it’s Mephistopheles, it can probably wait.” Martini didn’t sound angry, annoyed, or uninterested—he sounded tired.
    “We don’t think it can,” the agent said. “The teams involved called for direction.”
    Martini sighed. “Okay.” We followed the agent out of the library, to the elevators, and back up to the level where we’d arrived, what I was pretty sure was the Bat Cave level. I wasn’t positive—I could have been here before or never hit this floor at all. I felt like a small rat in a really large maze inside the Science Center.
    We headed to a large room within the Bat Cave that was a lot like Batman’s inner sanctum, only no one was in a rubber suit with a nifty cape. Lots of big screens, lots of computer terminals, lots of other things I couldn’t identify. The décor screamed Command Center.
    Martini and I unhooked just as Christopher ran in from another door. “Glad they found you,” he said to Martini. “It’s more of a Field situation, from what little I’ve gotten.”
    Martini nodded, and they stood side by side in front of the main screens. Any animosity there had been between them in the library seemed gone. I had to figure this wasn’t any ordinary problem.
    “What do we have?” Martini asked as images came up on-screen.
    A new A-C answered. “East Base reports clustered activity.”
    “Clustered activity?” I couldn’t help it, I had to ask.
    “Multiple parasites,” Christopher answered. Without snarling or glaring. Either he’d taken a happy pill or this was a really scary thing. “We have the media under control—there was enough time for that—but not the actual manifestations.”
    “How many?” Martini asked. Just like at JFK, there was no indication of humor or lightheartedness.
    The A-C who’d brought us here cleared his throat. “At least fifty.” Images popped up on the big screens in front of us. This was a sports fanatic’s dream TV set up—we had picture within picture, every game on side-by-side, and then some. All fifty manifestations were on-screen, which now meant we were watching horror movie tryouts.
    Some of the hopefuls were really giving it their all to win America’s Most Terrifying Monster. I wanted to figure out a way to tell them all they weren’t going to make it to the finals, but considering what was in front of me, some of them had an excellent chance of making Mephistopheles really proud.
    “Jeff, you’re live to the Field,” another one said quietly.
    Martini started talking, with a lot of authority and very, very fast. As if he were the world’s fastest auctioneer on some serious speed. So fast I realized I couldn’t comprehend it; it was like a barrage of data. I caught snippets—he was deploying different teams from other regions, requesting some military support for some of the affected areas, ordering other teams to disengage, and so on.
    I realized he was speaking at the standard A-C level, probably slowly, considering he seemed to be speaking clearly. It wasn’t just that I couldn’t understand it as a human—it was also making me feel dizzy.
    I took a step back. Didn’t get any better. My passing out right now wouldn’t be helpful to anyone, but the dizzy didn’t stop. The only saving grace was that I was pretty sure Martini wasn’t going to be able to pick up that I was about to barf or pass out—one small benefit of his empathic whatevers being burned out.
    Thankfully, for whatever reason, Christopher looked over his shoulder and backed up. Martini didn’t notice, probably because he was completely engrossed in saving the entire East Coast from becoming superbeing sushi.
    Christopher caught me before I went down. “I’m going to take Kitty to the Imageering side,” he said quietly to the A-Cs near us. “Don’t disturb him, but the moment he notices she’s gone, make sure he knows where she is.”
    He moved me through the door he’d come in from. It had a lot of screens and crap in it, too. I was too close to barfing my guts out to really take it in. He put me into a chair in a far corner, then squatted down. “You going to be okay?”
    I managed to nod,