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Chapter 92 – Free to a Good HomeAlex waited until Charlie was sitting calmly with Riley and Hanna and Grover. She jetted three hundred feet straight up and called her mom using Willow’s new app so it would appear to be from Alex’s regular phone.
“Alex? How are you calling on your phone, when I took it up to your room to charge it?”
Alex admitted, “It’s a Willow program.” She could just see her mom shaking her head.
“What’s the matter? I assume it’s personal, since you’re not calling the other way. Are you okay?”
Alex said, “Yeah, I’m fine. I just … What would you think of me bringing someone home to live with us for a while? She could use Annie’s bed, and we could put Annie’s stuff in the guest bedroom for when she comes to visit.”
Her mom asked, “Who is this girl? Is this like … Hanna?”
Alex admitted, “Umm, yeah. She’s an eight-year-old girl who just had her daddy murdered in front of her and then she had a crazed assassin try to shoot her in the face.”
Her mom cautiously said, “I notice you said ‘try’ in there. And she’s obviously still alive and healthy. What haven’t you told me yet?”
Alex answered, “You know how dad says I have telekinesis and electrokinesis? She has pyrokinesis. She can make fires with her mind. Only she can make really big fires and really hot fires.”
Her mom asked, “Alex, how bad is this?”
Alex begged, “She has really good control, and she doesn’t like hurting people, but she and her dad were kidnapped by a rogue semi-government agency and held prisoner for six months. And they were on the run for like two years before that, ever since these badguys murdered Charlie’s mom and kidnapped her the first time. And they made her do experiments to see what she could do. They sort of taught her a little too well. She and her dad were trying to escape, and the badguys killed her dad, and with his dying breath he told her to burn the whole place down and then make sure they could never do that kind of thing again. She did it. She destroyed like a dozen entire buildings and killed maybe two hundred people, but most of ’em were trying to shoot her. This was a big high-security research center for this agency, and now it’s nothing but ashes. And she needs my help. I’m not sure she’ll trust anyone but me or Hanna, maybe Jack and Grover and Riley, and she needs someone who can handle it if she slips up. Mom, I know this is asking an awful, awful lot, but pleeeeeeeeease?”
Her mom thought it over for a while, and then said, “Let me call your father. I’m not sure he’s ready to be a dad of a grade schooler again. Call me back in five minutes, okay?”
Alex waited nervously. She even used a stopwatch function on her tPhone so she wouldn’t call too early. Five minutes seemed to creep by, even if the hundredths of a second column on the stopwatch just zoomed along. “Mom? It’s me again.”
Her mom spoke. “Alex, your father and I talked this over back when you wanted Hanna to come stay for months, so this time we’d worked out most of the issues. So you can —”
“YEESSSSS!” she screamed.
“— but there are going to be a lot of rules.”
Alex quietly said, “Okay.”
Her mom insisted, “First, we’re going to have to have smoke and fire detectors all over the house, and CO2 fire extinguishers in every room your friend is going to spend time in. Your father already has detectors in the garage and laundry room with automatic fire suppression. We’ll need to put one in your bedroom in case she has a nightmare or something. You’ll be paying for that out of your own money.”
“Yes, Mom.” It was a good thing she’d made a lot of money taking pictures this year.
Her mom went on, “You’ll also be paying for new clothes for your friend. If she’s been held captive for half a year she probably has nothing that fits anymore.”
“Yes, Mom.”
Her mom added, “You’ll be tutoring her in anything she’s behind in, because a third grader who hasn’t been in school for a long time is probably not going to do well on third grade tests.”
“She’s pretty smart, Mom. But I’ll do it.”
Her mom continued, “And you’ll have to give up your job at Gloria’s so you can spend time with her while she gets used to Paradise Valley and meets new people. We’ll cover for you when you have to go ‘take photos’ but you can’t just assume we’ll be available when you want to go out on a date or just go off with your friends. If we have something going on at the same time, you’ll have to get a reliable babysitter we can trust or else cancel your date.”
Ugh. “Yes, Mom.”
Her mom finally got to the rules. “And she’ll have to obey our house rules, and do what we say. That means she’ll have to do her share of the chores, even if we’ll only give her chores we’re sure she can do. She’ll have to keep her side of your room clean, and she’ll have to bathe every day, and she’ll have to get good grades, and she’ll have to get used to the way we do things, which is probably very different from what she’s used to.”
“Okay.”
Her mom stressed, “Alex, this sounds like lots of fun at first glance, but you’re about to find out it’s a phenomenal amount of work. You’ll be getting her up in the mornings and getting her fed and getting her dressed. You’ll be driving her to school in the mornings and picking her up in the afternoons, and we’ll have to make arrangements with the local Boys and Girls Club for her to go there until you can pick her up every day. We’ll have to find some way to fake all the things we’ll need for a girl to start in a new school in a new town. All kinds of records.”
Alex grinned. “Mom, that part’s easy. Jack will help. And Willow. Between the two of them, we could get records that prove she’s the Queen of Nigeria.”
“Nigeria doesn’t have royalty, honey.”
Alex groaned. “It was just an example. Her name is Charlie. Charlene Roberta. I was thinking she could be Charlene Mack, maybe Shar for a nickname, a cousin of mine on Dad’s side, and her father was just killed in a house fire so we’re taking her in, and you can be Aunt Barb.”
Her mom worried, “We’ll have to bring some of your father’s relatives into the secret whenever we have family get-togethers. The next wedding on his side of the family will be a nightmare.”
Alex suggested, “Charlie and I can stay home from it.”
“That won’t solve the problem forever, honey. And what are you going to do next year, when you’re going off to college?”
Alex automatically said, “I’m taking her with me.” Then she stopped and thought. “I guess. Maybe she’d rather go with Hanna and Janet, if I’m supposed to be in college classes and stuff all day. But we have all year long to work that out, and she may be sick and tired of having to share a room with a bossy ‘big sister’ by then.”
Her mom replied, “We’ll see how long it takes before you’re ready to be done with a ‘little sister’, too. Anything else?”
Alex said the part she hadn’t wanted to say. “There is one other thing. Danielle Atron’s still out there, and she has superpowers again. I’d feel a lot better if you had someone like Charlie to protect you.”
“Charlie’s that powerful?”
Alex admitted, “Yeah. Plus, Danielle thinks kids are worthless. She’ll never even suspect Charlie might be able to defend you. But she can. It won’t be pretty, but she totally can.”
Her mom insisted, “I want you to understand up front that if we have problems with Charlie, or Charlie has problems with us, you’ll have to have a backup place for her to go.”
Alex said, “I already do. Three of them.”
“THREE?”
“Uh-huh. Two on Jack’s base. One is Hanna and Janet’s, and I’m pretty sure the other is Jack’s house. And General Hammond said if Jack needed a place for Charlie to call him, because he has two granddaughters about her age and they live really close to him.”
So her mom finally agreed, “Okay. Now you just have to get her out here, since you flew out there the way only you can.”
“Oh. Right.” That was going to be a big problem. She wasn’t sure she could pull Charlie into her morph on a cramped, cold, low-oxygen Blackbird for an entire cross-country trip.
Alex hung up and dropped down to where Charlie was. “How’s stuff?”
Charlie smiled. “Grover’s really funny, but I can’t tell when he’s smiling.” Charlie leaned over and whispered in Alex’s ear. “Riley is really cute.”
Alex just smiled. “Guess what? You can come stay with me for a while, if you want to. At my house. With me and my mom and my dad. But you’ll have to share a room with me, and we’ll have to buy you some new clothes, and you’ll have to go to school and get all caught up from what you missed the last two years.”
Charlie gave her a serious look. “That’s easy. Daddy’s a professor.” She looked miserable for a couple seconds. “Daddy was a professor. An as-something professor of literature. Maybe ‘assistant’. A new professor, anyway. He was really smart, and he taught me. I can read and write and do math and draw and I know all fifty states!” She stared at the ground and struggled not to burst into tears.
Alex scooped Charlie up with her TK and pulled Charlie into her arms. “It’s okay to cry, honey.”
Charlie sobbed against Alex’s leotard and sniffled, “I don’t like crying, and now I’m all stopped up with snot again.”
Alex told her, “I know it hurts, and it’s okay to cry when you feel really bad. I cry sometimes, too.” Charlie looked at her like she was a great big liar. “I do! I’m not Terawatt all the time, you know. Sometimes I’m a normal person with a normal family.”
Charlie whimpered, “I’d like to be a normal person sometimes, too.”
Alex hugged her again and said, “Well, you can come live with me, but you’ll have to pretend you’re my little cousin Charlene and stuff.”
Charlie whispered, “I never got to do that sleepover with my friends. They prob’ly don’t even remember me anymore.”
Alex softly murmured, “Their loss. But now you have me, and everyone here, and you’ll have my parents, too, and you’ll have new friends at school, and they’ll be way better friends.”
Jack came strolling out of the Pentagon. He looked pleased. That was a good sign. He walked over to them and smiled. “Okay. Good news, kid. We shut those jerks down, and the nice general is going to be rounding up badguys and throwing them in the slammer. We might get to come back here and tell a nice judge all about what The Shop did to you and your mommy and your daddy, so we can get even more of ’em in trouble. How’s that sound?” He gave Charlie a smile and ruffled her hair.
She smiled a little bit and looked up at him. “That sounds really good.”
Jack sniffed his hand and told her, “And we need to get you a bath and some clean clothes, so we can fly to Tera’s house and get you all settled in. And we’re gonna have to get you some new clothes, and some new toys, and some new books, and some other stuff.”
Alex said, “Well, she can have any of my old stuff she wants. And we have stores in California, you know.”
Jack gave her a surprised look. “Wow, you mean out in the wild west you have stores? Don’t the cowboys and Indians tear ’em up all the time?”
Charlie giggled wetly. “He’s funny.” She had to do a bunch of sniffling, too.
Hanna asked, “Do we need to go back to the base to do that?”
Jack shook his head. “Nah. It’ll be better if we go to a safehouse where she can do the whole clean-up, and I’ve got Sergeant Scott rounding up some clothes for her.”
Alex asked, “How do you know what sizes to get?”
Jack answered, “Well, her sneakers have the size stamped on the bottom and she hasn’t worn it off yet. And Scott has a six-year-old girl, so he has a pretty good idea on girls’ clothes and girls’ sizes and what they wouldn’t be seen dead in. I told him if he wasn’t sure on the sizing to just buy one of each size and we’d worry about it later. You’ll probably need the larger sizes in another couple months, once she starts eating right and getting plenty of exercise.”
Alex said, “That’s silly.” She peeked at the collar of Charlie’s shirt and the back of Charlie’s overalls, and gave Jack the sizes. Then she asked, “Charlie? Do you want to stick with overalls, or would you like some skirts and dresses? I’ve got a bunch of overalls I like, and we’d sort of look like twins.”
Charlie wondered, “Can I wear overalls like yours?”
Alex nodded. “Sure. And we’ll get you some nice church dresses like mine, so we can go sing. I like singing in church.”
Charlie nervously asked, “Can I go to church anymore? Daddy was really mad at God for letting Mommy get killed and everything else, and I don’t know if I can go in a church now.”
Alex hugged her. “Oh, honey, God won’t be mad at you just because you’re mad at him. And he’ll understand that your daddy was really mad and really hurt, but it wasn’t God that did the bad things. It was people.”
Charlie asked, “Do you believe in God?”
Alex hugged her and said, “Charlie, I’ve been in other dimensions and other universes. I’ve met someone who was in Heaven for a while. I’ve been in a hell dimension and seen a gateway to another one. I’ve fought a hellgoddess and met an Earth goddess. After all that, I think I pretty much have to believe there’s a Higher Power out there.”
Charlie just stared at her. After a little bit, Charlie asked in a small voice, “Would you tell me those stories someday?”
“Sure.”
Jack asked, “Can I get to listen in, too?”
“Me, too,” Riley spoke up.
“And me,” Grover added.
“Me, too,” Hanna murmured.
Jack chipped in. “And I think there’s gonna have to be a lot of buttered popcorn and jujubes.”
Alex was pretty sure jujubes were candy, but she really would rather have some Twizzlers or Mounds bars or something like that. Even if she was pretty sure that she’d be doing all the talking, and everyone else would be sitting around eating hot buttered popcorn while she rambled until her throat was all dry.
A big Humvee pulled up, with Sergeant Walters driving. He saluted Jack. “Sir, I got directions to a DHS safehouse that’s appropriate. And Sergeant Harriman said the Cessna would be here and ready when you are.” Everyone piled in, with Charlie squeezing in between Alex and Hanna in the very back seats.
Alex checked. “The Cessna?”
Jack grinned. “Sure! You don’t think I’m gonna let you and Charlie whoosh off to the Left Coast without me coming along to make sure everything goes okay, do you? And anyway, I’ve got presents to deliver.”
Alex cautiously asked, “What kind of presents?”
He stalled. “Well … there’s the stuff Willow’s going to be bringing down, and then there’s the other stuff Sergeant Scott’s gonna be loading on the jet, like the stuff your folks want to make sure is in the house.”
Alex frowned. “Mom wanted me to pay for all that stuff.”
Jack slowly said, “Yeah, she sort of said that, and I might have suggested … in some small way … that it had already been purchased …”
Charlie whispered a little loudly, “Did he fib to your mom?”
Alex pretend-whispered, “Yeah, but that’s Jack. We try not to fib to my mom about anything.”
“Not anything?”
Alex nodded. “Not anything. The only stuff I don’t tell Mom is the secret stuff the government is counting on me not telling anyone outside our group. And when you come to live with us, you’ll have to tell me and Mom everything. How school’s going, if anyone’s being mean to you or making you mad, who you’re making friends with, who’s the cutest boys in your school, if you have any slips with your powers, when you get really great grades, all that stuff.”
Charlie’s eyes got bigger. “Everything? Really?”
Alex nodded again. “Everything. You’ll see I tell her everything, even when it’s not good, and it really makes stuff go a lot better. It’s hard enough having a secret identity. You need to be honest about the other stuff. So you’ll be Charlene Mack, my little cousin, and you’re coming to live with us after your daddy just died and there was a big fire so you lost everything.”
Charlie looked at her oddly. “But that’s true. Except the cousin part. And Mack instead of McGee. But they sound a lot alike.”
Jack smiled. “That’ll make your cover easier to stick with.”
Hanna spoke up. “A cover that’s easy to remember is the best kind.”
Jack added, “And we’ll have the paperwork on Charlene Mack, showing she’s been home schooled and she’s ready to start third grade. We’ll have everything including a Social Security Number that’s got the right sequencing for her age, and a birth certificate, and anything you need.”
Charlie asked, “And can I have friends again?”
Jack ruffled her hair. “Sure you can, kiddo.” Then he pretended that her hair made his hand smell funny.
Charlie asked, “Can my middle name be Victoria, like Mommy?”
Jack told her, “Sure. Let me just make sure my computer guys know all that jazz.”
Jack had Sergeant Walters drive through a fast food joint and get them all food. Charlie chowed down on her kid’s meal, and Alex started eating a bag of burgers. They were both done by the time the Humvee pulled into a complex full of condos. Sergeant Walters followed his navigation system up to a condo with a large garage door. He operated a remote control, and the door swung open.
Jack hopped out and said, “Major, Sergeant, why don’t you take a peek through the house, while I stretch my legs outside.”
Hanna spotted what was going on, and volunteered, “Me, too!” She clambered over a seat and slid out one of the rear doors.
Charlie asked, “What’s goin’ on?”
Alex wasn’t totally sure, but she guessed, “Jack’s just being careful. This isn’t our condo. We’re borrowing it. So someone else knows about it, and Jack wants to make sure we don’t get any surprises from anyone we don’t like.”
Charlie frowned. “I don’t like those kinds of surprises.”
Alex helped Charlie out of the Humvee and used her TK to grab several energy bars out of her gym bag, which had been moved into the rear of the vehicle at some point before she got in. The burgers had been fine, but she just felt like she could still use some more calories.
Finn and Walters walked back into the garage and waited for Jack and Hanna to get back. Then Finn reported, “Interior secured, sir.”
Jack nodded and said, “Exterior looks okay, but I’d rather not spend the night here.” He closed the garage door and then put a metal spike in the garage door track so the door couldn’t go up more than an inch, even if someone else had a remote control.
Alex reminded herself to keep watching Jack, because he knew stuff she needed to learn. And he was just full of tricks.
She led Charlie to the master bathroom upstairs, and asked, “You can take a bath all by yourself, right?”
“Sure I can,” Charlie insisted.
She checked to be sure. “Do you want me to hang around, just in case?”
Charlie thought about it for several seconds. “Umm, maybe?”
So Alex told her, “You go ahead and take a bath, and I’ll make sure there’s a good hair dryer so we can dry your hair afterward. Okay?”
“Okay.”
So Alex puttered around, looking in cupboards and the closet, while Charlie used the bubble bath that was beside the tub, and then washed her hair twice. When Alex thought Charlie was about ready to get out, she flew over and made sure Charlie had gotten all the smoke and grime out of her hair. Then she let Charlie be a big girl and drain the water and dry herself off.
Hanna brought in a clean set of clothes for Charlie, which Alex assumed meant Sergeant Scott had swung by with some new clothes. It was a cute top and overalls set with some new white sneakers. Alex let Charlie get dressed before she dried Charlie’s hair for her with the fancy hairdryer she’d found in the drawers next to a curling iron, a styling iron for hair straightening, and three different brushes, all still in wrappers. Alex straightened Charlie’s hair just a little, so her hair looked sort of like Alex’s mom’s hair. Then she said, “We’ll get you your own hairbrush, and you can decide if you want to use my hair dryer or get one of your own.”
“Really?” Charlie asked excitedly.
“Really, really,” Alex did her best Shrek imitation. Charlie giggled a little. “Okay, you’re dressed and your hair’s all done. Let’s head home.”
Charlie asked, “Your home?”
Alex hugged her. “Our home. From now on, it’s our home.” Charlie hugged her hard and started sniffling, which almost made Alex cry, too.
When they went down to the living room, everyone was waiting, except Riley and Hanna. Sergeant Scott was packing stuff from a dozen shopping bags into a good-sized suitcase. There were shoes and socks and undies and overalls and tops and pants and skirts and a really cute windbreaker, and a ton of stuff like that. Alex figured Sergeant Scott had to be a really great dad for some little girl.
Jack stepped into the kitchen and talked on his earjack. Then he came back with a smile. “Hey, there, boys and girls! How’s about we take our nice, clean, non-grimy Charlie and go hop on our plane?”
Alex said, “Sure. I’d like to get home.”
Jack ushered everyone down to the garage and took the spike out of the garage door tracks. Then Charlie and Alex clambered into the Humvee with Jack and Sergeant Walters. The garage door went up, and Sergeant Scott was clambering into a similar Humvee with Riley.
Hanna came over and hopped into Alex’s car. “Are you sure this will be okay with my mom?” she asked Jack.
Jack nodded. “Sure I’m sure. I even asked her and everything.”
Alex didn’t get what they were talking about until they got to the air force base. She found out that Hanna and Jack were going along to Paradise Valley to help get Charlie settled in. And Riley was helping the sergeants load stuff into the cargo hold. Alex figured all that stuff had to be for Charlie.
She was going to have to figure out something really nice to do for Jack and Riley. She already had something nice in mind for Hanna.
She got Charlie all buckled in her seat and made sure there were energy bars and snacks within reach. Then she warned Charlie, “Okay, they’ll probably take off really fast, but it’ll be okay. Then we’ll go super-fast and land in California in about three hours.”
After Alex got a peanut butter sandwich and a carton of milk into Charlie, a certain really tired eight-year-old dozed off in her chair. Jack whispered from his chair, “You might want to hold her hand and wake her up if she starts having a nightmare. She’s just had the worst day ever, and grown men could get PTSD from what she went through. Only thing is, if she has a nightmare, she might have a little problem with those powers.”
“Ooh. Yeah.” Alex carefully took Charlie’s hand and just lightly held it. If Charlie had a nightmare and threw a giant fireball or something, it could be really bad to be in a tiny jet with her. Probably the only one who could survive that would be Alex.
Not that Hanna was afraid. Hanna didn’t do ‘afraid’. And Jack was really incredibly brave. But just in case, Alex held Charlie’s hand with her left, while she used her right to write her report with a stylus on the tablet. At least this report was pretty simple. The Batman one had been ginormous. And there were the two ‘auxiliary personnel’ documents, which she was starting to write the same stuff down that she’d written before. Would Jack mind? She was guessing not, but she was guessing that Walter was the one who had to use the documents. Maybe she’d call Walter and make sure the documents were okay for him.
Charlie did some groaning and whimpering, so Alex squeezed her hand and whispered, “It’s okay, I’m here.” Charlie settled down and squeezed her hand, which Alex really liked. She wondered if this was what it was like for moms, and she wondered if she’d ever get to have kids. She was trying not to think about that, because kids stuck with her powers and not enough control over them? Mega-horrible. She’d rather never have a baby than subject a little kid to some of the awful stuff she’d gone through. Or even worse, some of the really mega-awful stuff she’d seen, like not being able to stop being a silvery blob, or being on fire all the time, or going crazy, or not being able to control your lightning, or just glowing a weird color all the time.
After Charlie woke up and just before they landed, Alex squeezed her hand and asked, “Wanna see a magic trick?”
“Umm … maybe?”
Alex gave her a smile and then went silvery before diving into the gym bag and doing her silvery clothes change. Then she stayed silvery, flew back into her seat, and went normal as plain old Alex, who had matted-down hair from wearing a wig-cap and a wig most of the day. She smiled. “Hi. I’m Alex. And who are you?”
Charlie’s jaw dropped open. “That was amazing! Can you turn into other people?”
Alex grinned. “No, just me. This is what I really look like. I’ve cut my hair short and dyed it darker, and I wear flats as Alex Mack. So I look totally different from Terawatt.”
Charlie asked, “Does Action Girl do the same thing?”
Hanna hadn’t been wearing her mask since they got on the jet, so she explained, “As Hanna, I leave my hair long, and I put it up like this for ops.” She undid her braid and let her long hair trail down gracefully.
Charlie whispered, “Wow, you’re really pretty.”
Alex whispered back, “When she’s wearing makeup, she looks like a supermodel, except she’s not six feet tall and a size zero.”
Charlie asked, “Can I have a disguise for when I go on missions?”
Jack frowned. “Charlie, I don’t want to pull an eight-year-old in on missions. That’s not why we rescued you. Even if you can take out a platoon of badguys, that doesn’t mean you should.”
Alex said, “But we sure could’ve used you in Arizona. And Downingtown. It’s too bad you’re not twenty-one.”
Charlie pouted. “I will be! In … umm … thirteen years. And a half.”
Jack patiently corrected her, “Twelve and a half years. And by then, I’ll be thrilled to have you helping. However, I’m really old, so I’ll probably be retired by then, and Riley Finn can be the one who has to worry about you and Alex and Hanna getting into trouble.”
When they got to Camp Atron, there was a big SUV waiting for them, and a sergeant waiting by it. Jack told the guy that he didn’t have the clearance to be their driver, and Jack would do the driving. Then, once the guy left to go back to the motor pool, Jack had everyone pile into the car while he and Alex moved all the boxes and stuff into the back of the SUV. Alex noticed that besides the big suitcase, there were about a dozen fancy smoke-and-fire detectors, plus over a dozen CO2 fire extinguishers, all of them still in their boxes. And Jack also took the fancy toolkit that she was pretty sure was supposed to stay in the Cessna.
Jack did something else he wasn’t supposed to, and disconnected the GPS unit in the car, which meant even the Camp Atron motor pool wouldn’t be able to tell where Alex lived. Alex decided she liked having Jack’s sneakiness around at times like this, because it was protecting her family a ton.
Then he drove them out through the security checkpoint at the front gate, straight to Alex’s house, like he’d driven the route a dozen times before. Alex figured that Willow had given him directions and he’d even paid attention. He parked in the driveway next to her dad’s car, which was still making those ticking metal sounds, so she figured her dad just got home from work. Jack let Alex lead the way up to the front door. And, as they got out of the car, he checked his phone. “Okay, Willow should be here in under ten minutes, with more stuff.”
“More stuff?” Alex wondered.
“Yep,” he nodded. “She insisted on doing some shopping for Charlene on her way to meet us here.”
Alex asked Charlie/Charlene, “Do you like chocolate cake?” Charlene nodded eagerly. “Well, Willow makes a great chocolate cake, and it has a secret ingredient so it’s good for you, too.” Alex reminded herself to stick with ‘Charlene’ and ‘Shar’ for Charlie’s names, so everyone could stick with the cover story.
“What kind of ingredient?” Charlene wondered.
Alex smiled. “It’s a secret. I’ll tell you after you eat a piece. But Jack knows, and I know, and my dad knows, and we all love Willow’s chocolate cake. So it’s not bad. It’s just a surprise.”
Charlene looked really sad. “Daddy tried, but he wasn’t very good in the kitchen.”
Alex patted her on the shoulder. “My mom’s great in the kitchen, and she can teach you. I’m still learning. But I make about a third of the dinners now. Dad makes about one out of five, and Mom makes the rest. And you can help me if you want. It’s how I learn, from helping Mom.”
Hanna said, “My new mom is teaching me. She says that the things I knew how to cook are not what a modern woman needs to know how to cook. I could roast caribou meat over an open fire, and a few other things like that, but I could not use anything in a modern kitchen.”
Charlene stared open-mouthed at that.
Just as Alex was ringing the front doorbell, Willow pulled up and parked on the street. Jack trotted over and helped her with her stuff. It looked like Willow had a big bag from Toys ’R’ Us, and a smaller bag from Barnes and Noble, and a couple of bags from Justice clothing, and maybe some more stuff Alex wasn’t seeing yet. It looked like Charlene was about to get deluged with stuff.
Alex’s mom opened the front door, and Alex stayed with Charlene so she could do the introductions. Willow and Jack came in with a bunch of bags from Willow’s car, and Alex let her mom lead everyone into the living room.
Charlene looked around at the house and said, “Wow, this is really nice.”
Alex grinned. “Mom, Dad, this is your new niece, Charlene Victoria Mack, who we’ll just call ‘Shar’. Shar, this is your Uncle George and your Aunt Barb.”
“Umm, hi,” Charlene tried nervously.
Alex’s mom smiled. “Oh, aren’t you the cutest little thing? How old are you?”
“Eight and a half,” Charlene insisted.
Alex’s dad grinned. “It’s nice to meet you, Shar. Do you think you’d like to live here with Alex and us?”
Charlene nodded eagerly.
Alex told her parents, “And this is Jack, who you met once before, and you’ve apparently chatted with him on the phone. And Willow, you already know. And this is my friend Hanna.”
Jack put an arm around Willow and teased, “And, as they used to say, beware of geeks bearing gifts.”
“Jack!” Alex complained.
Willow bubbled, “Well, when Jack told me Alex was getting a ‘new little cousin’ and she needed new everything, I figured the least I could do if I’m gonna be Shar’s not-really-an-aunt, is get her some stuff, so I did some shopping before I drove down, and you have to have good books, and then there were the cutest things in the store next door so I bought some new bedsheets for Charlene and some pretty tops, and then I had to run into the toy store while I was near it and I got some toys, because girls need their things, and I figured Shar needed her own bathroom stuff, so I got some more stuff, and maybe I kinda got carried away with the shopping-ness.”
Alex winced a little. “Mom, I know you said for me to buy Shar’s things, but Jack’s people and Willow kind of went overboard, so we’re gonna have to look at all the new stuff and then figure out what I’ll buy her. And I think we have all the fire suppression stuff we’re gonna need for like a century, because Jack got carried away, too.”
Her dad said, “I picked up two small automatic fire suppression systems from the supply area on my way out of the plant — I’ll buy two new ones to replace them tomorrow — and we’ll put them in your bedroom and bathroom. How much other stuff did you get?”
Alex looked at Jack, who admitted, “We bought out a hardware store. Fifteen CO2 fire extinguishers and eleven high-end compact smoke-and-heat detectors.”
George smiled. “Well, we already have really good ones with chem lab fire suppression systems in the garage and the room off the garage, and we have ordinary smoke detectors in the kitchen and the upstairs hallway.”
Jack shrugged. “Well, I figured Hanna and I could help install what we brought and put ’em wherever you want ’em before we go home. And we’ll help get Shar situated, and I’ll leave you with a few more numbers you can call in case you have any problems.”
Willow smiled. “Really, you can just call me on your tPhone and I can re-direct the call anywhere it needs to go.”
Alex looked at the clock and asked, “Umm, Mom, it’s 5:30. Do you have dinner going?”
Her mom said, “No, I was just going to fix spaghetti and some of Willow’s zucchini and a green salad. I didn’t realize we were going to have …” She stopped and counted. “… seven people for dinner.”
Jack ‘helpfully’ contributed, “But on the bright side, none of us eat like Alex.”
At the same time, Willow apologized, “Oh, I’m so sorry, I shouldn’t have come at dinner time, and I did bring a couple of chocolate cakes but they’re still in the trunk, and I sure hope they didn’t roll over or anything because I forgot to check, and I’ve got some more zucchini, which is good, because Jack needs more fruits and vegetables in his diet.”
Alex’s dad insisted, “Willow, don’t be silly. You’re always welcome at any time. And any friend of Alex’s is welcome to drop by. We just need to cook some more food.”
Alex’s mom said brightly, “I know, how about Shar and Willow and Hanna help me cook, while George shows Alex and Jack where to install everything.”
So that was what they did. Alex and her dad and Jack and Hanna hauled all the rest of the stuff out of the SUV and Willow’s car and put it all on the floor in the living room. Then her dad marked the spots for the fire extinguishers and fire detectors. Most of the fire extinguishers just went in closets or cabinets, although for half the closets they went ahead and mounted the fire extinguisher on an inside wall. The automatic fire suppression systems went on the ceilings in Alex’s bedroom and bathroom. Alex did a lot of the installations, because she could use her TK to hold the mounting panel on the wall or ceiling to get the holes right, punch the holes in the plasterboard, slide the plastic molly bolts in, hold Jack’s cordless screwdriver to drive in the molly bolts, hang the mounting panel, and put the whatever on the wall or ceiling, all in about a minute. And she didn’t need a ladder or anything. So they had everything mounted and tested before dinner was ready.
When they went into the kitchen, they found Hanna had gotten out a card table and folding chairs and put it next to the kitchen table, so they had room for everybody and they could just eat casually in the kitchen. And there was a big bowl of spaghetti with two kinds of red sauce, one with lots of hamburger and ground Italian sausage in it, and one with no meat but lots of chopped veggies in it. And there was garlic bread and a green salad and a bowl of fruit salad.
They sat down and Willow beamed. “And Shar helped!” All the adults told Shar what a good job she did.
Hanna pouted. “I was not as much help.”
Alex’s mom disagreed, “Sure you were, honey. You chopped all the vegetables for the vegetarian sauce and the salad, and you helped Shar wash the salad greens and dry them and tear them up. Just because you were really amazingly fast with the chopping doesn’t mean you didn’t help a lot.”
Alex was pretty sure that chopping stuff with a big knife was the perfect Hanna task.
Hanna blushed a little. “Thank you.” She looked at Alex. “Willow taught me how to make a vegetarian spaghetti sauce, and she even told me how to turn it into a non-vegetarian sauce.”
And, after they ate a bunch of dinner, Shar loved the chocolate cake and didn’t believe them when they said it had grated zucchini in it. But Willow promised to teach her to make a chocolate zucchini cake and then she’d know.
After that, while Alex and her mom cleaned up in the kitchen, Charlene got to open all the presents and look at all the clothes she now had. Along with all the clothes, Willow had bought her about twenty books and two board games and a bunch of DVDs and four Barbie dolls. Alex hadn’t even heard of “Ticket to Ride” and “Forbidden Island”.
Alex got out into the living room in time to see the first Barbie doll. “Willow!”
Willow blushed a little. “I couldn’t help it, it just looked so pretty, and I had to buy it, and isn’t it the most awesome Barbie ever?”
Alex could hardly believe it, but Mattel had a blonde ‘Terawatt’ Barbie. Alex had to admit it went with Barbie’s blonde hair and her figure, but still! It had a little mask that hooked over Barbie’s sort-of-ears, and black tights and a white leotard and white gloves and white knee-boots. Willow had also bought the ‘Terawatt secret identity’ Barbie outfit, which looked like some sort of girly executive type in a baby blue blazer and matching skirt and high heels and a hairclip, and had a pair of black-framed glasses that didn’t really make Barbie look all that different from Terawatt.
Alex asked, “Is this licensed with Driscoll Enterprises? Because I kinda doubt Louis’s dad has enough legal muscle to push Mattel around.”
Willow shrugged. “I guess you need to check.”
Then Charlene pulled out a matching Skipper that was dressed in a coordinated superheroine outfit but was at least in flats. And Willow had picked up a cute set of pink overalls and sneaks for Skipper so she had a secret identity, too. Charlene gave Alex a big grin. Then she gave Willow a huge hug.
There was also a Barbie’s Friend Kara doll, which looked a lot like Nicole, and a Barbie’s Friend Theresa doll, which had red hair. Both of them had more normal clothes. Alex picked up the Theresa doll and said to Shar, “And this will be Willow. We’ll have to find a Barbie computer hacker playset for her.”
She was pretty sure the snickering behind her was Jack.
Okay, Willow had gotten Charlene a ton of great stuff. Besides the Barbie stuff and the books, there were three videogames for little girls, almost a dozen age-appropriate DVDs that ranged from “Finding Nemo” to a couple Alex hadn’t even seen, like “The Iron Giant” and season 1 of “Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha”. Alex didn’t remember telling Willow she wanted to look at the Nanoha one, but Willow might have seen Alex’s list of books and anime to go check out.
Oh, crud, if Willow had looked at those lists, then that meant there were a bunch of potential presents for Willow that were pretty much shot. Mega-crud!
The next thing they did was gather up all of Shar’s new clothes and presents, while Alex’s mom and dad got Jack and Willow to help move all of Annie’s stuff out of the bedroom into the guest room so Shar could have Annie’s bed. When Jack whistled down the stairs, Alex helped Hanna and Shar carry everything upstairs to put away on the Annie side of the room.
Shar just stared at the room. “This is your room? And I get to stay here, too?”
“Yep,” Alex said. “You can have that bed, and I’ll have this one, so you get that dresser and that desk and that closet. How’s that sound?”
Willow popped her head in and grinned. “And I got some really cute bedsheets for you!”
Alex used her TK to pull Annie’s sheets off the bed, hold the comforter in the air, and make the bed with the new ‘puppies and kittens’ sheets Willow had bought. Then she helped Hanna and Shar put all the toys and clothes and books away. Annie had a bookshelf that was now empty, so the toys and games and DVDs all went there, while the clothes went into the dresser and closet. Okay, Alex made everyone wait while she cleaned the dresser drawers and the closet, but that only took a few seconds because she was using her TK to wipe down all the drawers and the closet shelf and the closet floor all at the same time.
While she did some vacuuming with her TK so Annie’s side of the room was clean enough for Charlene, Alex called Louis on her tPhone.
“Hey, Tera, what’s up?”
She asked, “Did you know Mattel has a Terawatt Barbie and a Terawatt-sidekick Skipper? With ‘secret identity’ clothes?”
Louis groused, “Well, that’s one of the lawsuits Dad has going right now. We might have to have Terawatt make a notarized statement about that.”
Alex worried, “Won’t I have to admit who I am and stuff?”
“No way. California lets people participate in lawsuits and file lawsuits under pseudonyms. I think it’s a Hollywood thing, so actors and actresses could file a lawsuit under their stage name when that wasn’t their real name. Porn stars have used it, too.”
Oh, great, just what she wanted, to be connected in any way to porn stars. Ick.
Jack stepped over. “Wait, Mattel doesn’t have permission to do a Terawatt Barbie? I’ve got this one. I’ll get Walter on it ASAP. We can’t have a temporarily deputized representative of the DHS being abused like this. It’ll lead to even worse abuses later.”
Louis added, “And if you can come up with a way we can pay Terawatt legally, I’d appreciate it. Because I don’t think the IRS is gonna let us just ‘claim’ that we paid a superheroine a bunch of money with no records anywhere. And then what does Terawatt do about income tax on that income?”
Jack grimaced. “Okay, I think I need to run this one by General Hammond. Or Walter. Or maybe I’ll just ask the smartest person in the world. She’ll know.” He turned his head. “Hey, Willow! We need a really big brain! Got a sec?”
Charlene quietly asked Alex, “Is she really the smartest person in the whole world?”
Alex told her, “Well, I think so. And Jack thinks so.”
“Wow.”
Willow popped in and listened to Jack’s explanation. Then she thought for a few seconds and said, “Oh! I know what to do!” She pulled her phone out of her pocket and hurried down the hall.
Alex figured they would hear a really smart solution one of these days.
* * *
It took a while to get everything settled and everyone dealt with. And Alex needed to get Charlene to bed, in her new bed. Charlene happily brushed her teeth and brushed her hair, like it was a privilege instead of a chore. Alex wondered just what those creepy guys in The Shop had been doing to her for months.
Alex tucked Shar in and asked, “Are you gonna be able to go to sleep okay?”
Shar whispered, “Could you maybe stay here with me? I’m not scared or anything! But … I’d feel better if you were in here, too.”
Alex looked around and had an idea. “How about I turn out the big light, but I work at my desk with my reading light?”
Shar smiled. Alex hugged her and tucked her in.
Willow peeked in at the door. “Can I say goodnight?”
Hanna stuck her head in as well. “Me, too.”
Alex looked over at Shar, who nodded shyly. So Hanna came in and hugged Shar goodnight, and then Willow came in and hugged Shar goodnight, and then Alex’s mom did, too. Alex’s mom stroked Shar’s hair and said “If you need anything, even in the middle of the night, you just let us know. Okay?”
“ ’Kay.”
Willow hugged Alex, too and said, “I haveta get going, but this is so great of you, and she’s just so cute. Can I really be an aunt?”
Alex grinned. “With all the stuff you bought, I think you already are.”
Hanna gave Alex a hug, too. “I will see when I can come back and visit some more.”
Alex hugged her back. “You do that, Aunt Hanna.” Hanna smiled over at Shar.
Jack said from the doorway, “Us guys don’t do icky stuff like hugs. We might get cooties.” Shar giggled. “But you take care, and if you want anything, just call me. Alex can get me anytime, day or night, on her phone, so you just get her to call. Only … no ponies. I’m under strict orders not to buy anyone a pony.”
Alex went over and hugged Jack, too. She whispered, “Thanks.”
He ruffled her hair like she was ten. “Sure thing, kiddo.”
Alex got out her reading light and turned out the ceiling light. The newly-installed fire suppression system had a little green light that flickered like every ten seconds, and it was pretty noticeable in the dark. She figured she was just going to have to get used to that, too.
She got all her homework done, and then she got in plenty of reading ahead on chemistry. She still wasn’t comfortable with the ‘limit’ thing in calc class, so she figured she’d get help in class before she did more reading ahead in there. Maybe she’d ask Willow to explain it to her, because Willow’s explanation would probably be better than what the book said. Willow had said she’d need to learn the periodic table, so Alex started in on that. Knowing about group 2 metals had already paid off in huge ways, so she figured she should memorize the entire thing, including the weird stuff. Then Alex worked some more on the computer course until she was really tired.
She slipped out to wash her face and brush her teeth, and then she put on her favorite flannel pajamas and went to sleep.
* * *
“Daddy! Daddy, no! NO!”
Alex came awake with a start. Charlene was having a nightmare. And the nice, air-conditioned room wasn’t air-conditioned anymore. It was hot. As hot as a sidewalk on a broiling day. Alex flew out of her bed.
“DADDY NO!”
Alex tried, “Charlie, you’re having a nightmare, just wake —”
“DADDY!”
Charlene jerked awake at Alex’s touch.
Suddenly, Alex’s clothes were on fire.
Interlude XVColonel Roger J. McNamara was facing the panel. There were six of them sitting there. He wasn’t sure that Hollister had ever met with more than two at a time before, which didn’t bode well for this meeting. He knew a lot of power brokers in D.C., but he only knew two of the people before him. He assumed that didn’t bode well for him, either.
The middle-aged woman in the general’s uniform with her brown hair in an updo crisply said, “The DSI is closed down and gone for good. You will not make any untoward gestures toward rebuilding it.” He just stood stiffly and listened. “Of the DSI’s 251 field agents, 109 are dead, 37 have been arrested, and 78 have turned themselves in to the DHS for security validation and possible redistribution to other government programs. Of the DSI’s 84 scientists, scientific assistants and lab techs, 63 are dead, 17 have been arrested, and 4 have turned themselves in for security evaluation. All computer support and administrative support who were on-site are dead, except for 5 secretaries who are being questioned by the DHS, and the entire personnel list for the Pentagon office — except for you — has been taken in for questioning. That leaves you with only 27 possible field agents, no computer support, no scientific support, no administrative personnel, no connectivity, and no funding.”
General Flagg growled, “You’ll be meeting with your 27 people individually and explaining the new reality to them. You’ll be working as a special cell in another agency. And you will not screw up again. I had enough trouble redirecting matters this time. I expect you and your men to carry a cyanide pill on you, and if apprehended, to take that pill. If any of your 27 agents don’t want to do that, then retire them. With prejudice.”
“Yes, sir. I understand sir.”
An older man in a gray suit and heavy eyebrows said, “We’ve brought in someone to get you up to speed on your new agency. He’ll provide the computers and support staff, and he’ll be your nominal boss. From here on out, you’ll get all directives through him.”
“Yes, sir.”
General Flagg snapped, “Dismissed.”
Colonel McNamara saluted, turned sharply, and marched out.
At the back of the room, another colonel was waiting. The man opened the door and walked into the hallway, too. He smiled. “McNamara. Nice to meet you. Even if I’m your boss, in unofficial settings you can call me Harry. The other times? Call me Colonel Maybourne. Oh, and welcome to the NID.”