Chapter 2

“We’ll write that up as a failed experiment,” I said.

“Failed experiment! You damned near killed two people! And I’ve got five security officers that aren’t exactly sure what they saw, other than every single bit of Helen. That’s including a supervisor that says he’d swear on a stack of Bibles that your hands were glowing!”

“That’s entirely possible. It wasn’t my hands themselves, it was the medical devices I was using that were generating light and shining through my skin.”

We were sitting at our kitchen table. Dora, Eve, and Helen were all in bed, resting. They were being tended to by literally all of the other women, plus Gloria and Holly.

Gloria had brought Holly over about ten minutes after we were done, with a police cruiser right behind her. She’d been driving Earl’s car on the wrong side of the road for most of the way. The only reason she wasn’t under arrest for reckless driving was ... well, rather obvious. At least she had an Australian driver’s license, so once she pulled into our house, the officer was able to put that on his report. The minor detail that she’d pulled into our driveway, and our security had simply waved her through, brought an end to that chase.

In the meantime, Mike was sitting at our table, trying to chew me out. Toby had gone over to stay with Emily, while Harry cleaned some things up. The door to the house opened, with Earl and Elroy coming in.

“Ah, good. That means I don’t have to file a stolen vehicle report, since my car is sitting outside. I don’t supposed you’ve seen our wife, have you?”

“You guys may as well come join me. Mike really, really wants to chew my ass right now, and I either need some assistance, or he does, one or the other.”

“Well, it’d be nice if you’d let us know what happened. We’d gone into town for a little bit, because some of my friends wanted to wish us a Happy New Year. We get back to our house, Earl’s car is gone, the doors are standing wide open, and both Gloria and Holly are gone. It was rather obvious that they hadn’t been kidnapped or anything like that, especially when Jimmy Thomas stopped by to tell us Earl’s car had been spotted driving here on the wrong side of the road,” Elroy said.

“I was telling Mike, it was a science experiment that went wrong. Very badly wrong.”

“Right. Dora was seriously injured, and was carried out of the mine shaft looking like she was dead. Our team was running down into the mine, so they didn’t see whatever it was you did, but when they brought Eve out, she had a concussion, a fractured skull, and a piece of stone that had obviously penetrated a lung stuck in her back. Eric helped the team get Eve out on a stretcher, bandaged her wounds, but ... he’s like me. We’ve seen a sucking chest wound like that, before. You’re in a world of shit unless you get into surgery pretty damned quickly, because your lungs fill up with your own blood.”

“So, they get back to the surface, you’re sitting by Dora’s head, with something in your hands that was glowing. Dora wakes up, then goes to sleep like she’s just exhausted and that’s it. You have the team put Eve down, you put a hand on her chest and on her head. Beth grabs hold of your head. Helen tells Harry she needs a bonfire, now, so Eric has our other guys grab some hay from the barn while they make an impromptu bonfire. Next thing they know, Helen is running around the bonfire, singing in some language that no one knows, and she’s completely naked.”

“Then your hands are glowing, incredibly brightly, and after a few minutes of that, Eve is completely healed up. No open wound on the back of her skull. No sucking chest wound, not because the stone was pulled out, it’s like the stone was never in there in the first place! By this time, we’ve got an ambulance here, but they don’t go to the hospital, they just go into your bedroom! Then Gloria and Holly show up and kick all of the medical people, including MY team, out of the bedroom.”

“Oh, and just to make things even more fun, there’s a piece of iron rail, down in that mine shaft, that looks like it was ripped up, off the floor, bent, and is half melted. Cal, I can handle a lot of weird shit. I’ve seen a lot of weird shit. This is something that has my weird shit meter pegged so much that I think the fucking needle has been bent, it’s been pegged over so hard. Now, I know you’re the boss and everything, but...”

I nodded. “Some things are just a little too weird. Fair enough. I was going to have to tell you the truth at some point. I really do like you, as a friend, and ... if I had been created in a lab, I’d be proud to claim you as one of my fathers. At least you haven’t gone screaming into the street, gibbering because of what’s been going on.”

He blew out a deep breath. “The thought crossed my mind a time or two. So, if you’re not some laboratory experiment courtesy of the CIA, what are you? An alien from another planet?”

“Yes.”

He sat back in his chair, stunned. I stood up, went over to the cabinet and pulled out a bottle of twelve year old Glenlivet. I opened the door where we kept glasses, grabbed four of them, then put a single ice cube into each of them from the freezer. I then poured about three fingers worth into each glass, then carried them over to the table.

“I believe that the old saying that it’s after five o’clock somewhere, applies. Oh, and this is sipping whiskey, not gulping whiskey, Mike.”

“I know the difference,” he quietly said.

“Cheers, then, and let’s not let this get any further down into your crew than you, at least at this point in time. Unfortunately, that includes Chuck and our personal team,” I said.

He took a sip of his whiskey. Earl and Elroy did the same, and then I did. I could see Mike’s eyes darting back and forth between Earl and Elroy, while he was trying to put two and two together. It didn’t take him that long.

After only a couple of minutes, his head started shaking. “I would swear that you’re a sixteen year old kid. Not some ancient guy from another planet that’s come here to save us from ourselves. If you know you and your ladies, the names are a dead giveaway, really. Caelistis, Evabethia, Belador, Lynevila. Cal, Beth, Dora, and Eve.”

I smiled, saying, “That’s because I really am a sixteen year old kid. Technically, seventeen, due to the differences in planetary rotation. Which is better than when I landed, because on my home planet, I was only fourteen. Other than that, as Elroy will tell you, the easiest way to tell a story is to inject a lot of truth in it. That way you don’t get tripped up. My Mother really was a world-class biologist, my Father was a rocket scientist. They worked in a secret government lab. When the lab was destroyed ... which, by the way, also meant my entire home planet was destroyed ... my parents had stuck me in a rocket that Dad had built and shot me into space. I landed here in August.”

He frowned, then. “But ... what about the whole Messenger from Above? End the fighting, destroy the drugs, and live in peace? And the whole Shiva thing”

I spent the next four hours, and two more bottles of Glenlivet, explaining to Mike everything that had happened in the last few months, including introducing him to Mycroft.

Harry and Beth joined us after an hour. Beth had helped her father secure not only the six healing devices, but also the Shiva devices, taking some lead that we’d used on each of the six devices to at least temporarily put the Shiva devices in some kind of cage. Then Beth had removed the rail from the mine.

The two of them sat rather quietly off to one side. At one point, Beth got up and made a phone call. Half a dozen extra-large pizzas were delivered for the house, with another half dozen for the guards.

Mike finally said, “Okay. I think I’ve got it. Jesus, and I thought some of the stuff we did in the jungle was completely hairy. You’ve been operating behind enemy lines with only limited local support for months.”

I frowned. “I supposed you could see it like that. Except no one in this house is my enemy, and I pretty much think that the local support has been rather unlimited, in its own way.”

He shook his head. “I’m not referring to Elroy and Earl. Or nearly everyone here in Reno County. I’m talking about the whole planet, and all of the other governments and militaries. If they had a clue about what’s been going on here ... I mean, REALLY going on here ... you’d have the entire US military on their way here, instead of working through Mexico, with the Russians and Chinese right behind them.”

“To what end?” Elroy asked. “You’ve seen the videos of what the Messenger can and has done. Cheyenne Mountain exists because it could take direct strikes from nuclear warheads and survive. We saw what happened in North Korea, so you know that could happen there. You saw the Chinese Navy, what ended up happening to their country. That’s ... Holly has told us, that’s what happened to Australia, thousands of years ago.”

Mike nodded. “You know, now that I know for sure about souls, that’s one of the things I can actually accept, that someone who died thousands of years ago is helping Holly.” He smiled. “I had to go to DC for business, courtesy of some of our ‘toys.’ I went to the Wall and made my amends, visiting a couple of people’s names. No one was home for those two men, but I got to talk to someone else that died in ‘69. So, yeah, I can believe that about Lara.”

He started to move his chair back, then frowned. “I was planning on going home, because we have a busy day tomorrow, with the Japanese and then your trip around the world. What’d you do, glue my feet to the floor as a joke?”

Harry laughed. “No, you did that yourself. We’ve been casually sitting here, eating pizza, and talking for four hours. There are three empty bottles of Glenlivet on the counter. Cal switched to regular sweet tea two hours ago. So did I. Elroy and Earl switched an hour ago.”

“Shit. I haven’t gotten drunk since the day I made it back to the World for the last time, and that was nearly fifteen years ago. What are you going to do with me?”

I sighed. “Probably help you strip down to your underwear, then make you as comfy as we can in one of the bathrooms. That way you won’t have far to go to throw up.”

He blinked. “That’s probably a good idea. I’m sorry about this, boss, but now that we’ve talked about it, I don’t feel so good.”

I used my speed to pick him up and carry him into the third bathroom. We made it in time. Beth brought me some blankets for him after a couple of minutes.

“Not much else to do except let him sleep it off. I probably ought to tell Eric,” I said.

“I think Ben is shift commander now,” she said. It actually only took opening our front door to find Ben, patiently sitting outside on a lawn chair.

“A little chilly out here, isn’t it?”

“You’d be surprised, Cal. Some good thermal underwear, a thermos with some hot coffee in it, and you can handle being on watch in some nasty places.” He looked behind me. “He finally unwound a little?”

“Yeah, I think so. He won’t have anything wrong that some aspirin and a cold pack won’t help with in the morning, whenever he finally wakes up,” I said.

Ben nodded. “Good. You don’t know, because you’re the principal. You do most of your interactions with us, as your regular guards, and with your personal team. So, you don’t see what he has to go through. Oh, and this is all completely deniable that I ever said anything, but ... he’s caught so much flack from various sources due to some of the shit that we’ve had to do, I’m surprised he’s still flying. At the same time, I can’t see him doing anything else. You’re his mission, and his missions always succeed.”

I frowned. “That sounds suspiciously military to me.”

“Nearly all of us served on the teams, at different times. I heard what Gage said, about Mike carrying his father out on his back. Mike did that. What he didn’t say was that he carried him ten miles further into the jungle on his back to first actually complete the mission, before he carried him out of the jungle. Unconventional warfare, at its finest. He really should have gotten the Medal for that operation. So, yeah, for me, ‘Rangers Lead the Way’, but I’ll follow Mike Douglas to hell and back if he asked. All of us would.”

He sighed. “So, if you need some ice cubes from Satan, just let Mike know. We’ll get them for you. Because while you’ve been the most infuriating principal we’ve ever had working for Wackenhut, you’re someone that Mike Douglas would go to hell for. We’re your team, Cal. You may piss us off at times, but we know you’re ... well, someone that it’s worth dying for to protect, not just because it’s our jobs, but because...”

He trailed off, a look of embarrassment on his face.

I stood outside for several minutes, Beth holding my arm.

Finally, I said, “Thank you, Ben.” I walked over to him, then held my hand out. He nodded, then took it, shaking it. “Happy New Year, my brother,” I said.

“Thank you. One of us will be right here in the morning when Mike’s ready.”

I had to hurry back inside, simply because I was concerned that I’d have to use heat to keep my face from freezing. Or at least keep the tears that were running down my cheeks from doing that.

Elroy and Earl had taken up positions in two of our recliners and were situated for the night. Harry was waiting. “We’ll keep Toby overnight, not an issue. Let us know how the girls all are in the morning.”

I nodded, then Beth followed me into the bedroom.

Eve looked the most chipper of the three patients. She was sitting up, eating a slice of pizza and talking with Hannah and Jennifer. “So, my sister ended up effectively killing me, but you saved me. Pretty much normal hero stuff for you, my love.”

I used my vision to look inside her. “Mike, what’s Eve’s health report?”

“Physically, Eve is perfectly fine. She’s actually a little bit stronger and more powerful than she was prior to the incident.”

“Thank you.”

Helen had some loose bandages on the bottoms of her feet. Her hair was considerably shorter than it had been. I looked inside her to make sure she was still pregnant, and gave off an audible sigh of relief.

Holly grinned. “I checked that right away, Cal. She’s still fine.”

Gloria nodded. “I’m just glad you had lots of aloe vera. With a couple of the other things I brought from home, by tomorrow afternoon, her feet should be healed up.”

“Sorry, I wasn’t paying a lot of attention. What happened?”

Helen snorted. “I didn’t pay attention to where I was going. As you saw when I did the wedding ceremony in Florida, I can use the energy of a fire to bring notice to the Sacred Souls that something needs their attention. That one was a small fire, because all that was needed was to let them know Mum was getting married to two worthy men. This time, I needed their help. Big help, big fire. The other minor detail is that clothing tends to interfere with my talking to them. Again, in Florida, not that big a deal.”

“I remember you said that most of the members of the ... tribe, I guess, is the best way to describe our Australian family ... had seen your boobs.”

“Exactly. I have no idea why, but it does make it easier for the Sacred Souls. This was so big, I knew I needed to be starkers. Should have kept me shoes on. I stepped right onto a couple of burning sticks. That’s why Mum did some trimming of me hair, too. It got a bit singed on one side.”

“Is that why you have aloe gel on the outside of your left leg?” I asked.

She nodded. “I had to get close to the fire. Mum and I have been talking, and Lara has been a part of this, too. Distance doesn’t matter to the souls, but this was probably the most amount of power they’ve sent through one of us in hundreds, if not thousands, of years.”

Holly nodded. “Yeah. Hannah was half-right. Once we got here after Mom’s driving experience ... and that was a story, in and of itself, not only with the steering wheel on the wrong side of the car, but the roads messed up, too ... anyway, we got Helen taken care of and then I checked with Beth and Harry. Lara recognized those damned things, all right. She recognized all of them.”

I closed my eyes, then opened them again. “SHIT! Sorry, I’m sometimes so damned stupid it’s not funny. Of course, Lara would know those stones. I didn’t even think to have you look at them, Holly.”

Gloria shook her head. “Don’t feel bad. Helen and I both saw them ... the six you have already, even if they were still in the lead ... when we came up. We’ve figured out that Lara is the Mother that we mentioned, too. It’s just not knowing about Holly until so late, then with all the other information ... none of us made that connection.”

“So, what’s up with the two devices that nearly caused a tragedy for us?”

“Mi amor, they’re his,” came a soft voice from further up the bed.

I looked inside of Dora. She appeared to be physically healed, and she still had the vestigial organ. “How are you feeling, Adorable Dora?”

“I’d prefer to not ever go through that again. We made a serious error, one that we didn’t even realize we could make.”

“The devices weren’t just waiting for another authorized user, they had some kind of defensive mechanism in them,” I said.

“Not quite,” she said. Margie handed her a cup of water, so she could take a sip. “I’m more genetically related to Ramaeshwara than anyone here. And we’re all, those of us of the Romany blood, the same as the Randhawa blood, direct descendants of Shiva himself. I had the thought, that perhaps I was related to him due to my ethnic heritage, that I might be able to activate the devices. That’s why I asked to try.”

“I messed up. Not in trying to activate them, that was easy. It told me, user authorized, then showed me a menu. I should have stopped, then. But it showed me all sorts of menus, and one of them caught my eye, telekinetic control. I thought to it, what does that do, and it showed me using my hands to move things with my mind, like you do. It asked me if I wanted to upgrade to that skill, so I stupidly said yes.”

“It’s convenient,” I said. I looked past Marcia and Margie, where there was a can of Coke on the dresser. I reached out with my mind, picked it up, and brought it over to me.

“Exactly. That’s what I thought it was going to do, just give me that ability. Then, all of a sudden, I felt ... a tremendous amount of power surging through me, more so than when you ‘upgraded’ me. I could literally feel myself changing inside, and there was no way that I could stop it. I was trying to scream out for help, when Eve slapped it from between my hands.”

I nodded. “Mike, how’s Dora doing?”

I didn’t know that he could make a sound like he was sighing. “The good news is that it doesn’t appear that there were any long term effects to her exposure to whatever it was. I actually wish I had been close enough. Perhaps a more secure experiment once we’re at the facility in California, only this time with bonfires ready if needed, and no sharp objects to penetrate lungs and hearts. The bad news is that Dora has had some cellular modification. I have some figures available.”

“What are they?”

“My most recent test for you was the night you were ‘upgraded.’ At that time, you measured 2,672 and 426, were a 45% DNA match with Cal, and a 50% DNA match with Eve and Beth. At this time, you measure 2,812 and 532, but are now only a 30% DNA match with Cal, Eve, and Beth.”

She started to cry. Margie and Marcia took her in their arms, then Beth and Eve did as well. Dora was crying that she wasn’t their sister any more. Gloria got up, taking me by the arm, leading me into the living room.

“You’re a man, so ... you’d try to fix it. She just needs to cry this one out.” She shook her head. “Do I want to know why my husbands are snoring like they’re drunk in your living room?”

“Because they are drunk? Seriously, this time it was for a good cause. Mike Douglas now knows the truth. He’s passed out in the third bathroom.”

She nodded, then tossed her head like a horse bothered by a fly. “Just like a man. Ah, well, it’s a good thing we women are here to keep you all under control.”

At my puzzled look, Gloria said, “It doesn’t matter to Dora that she’s now smarter and more capable than she was, by what seems to be a considerable amount. Her sisters, Beth and Eve, weren’t just that way because they called each other that, they were that on a cellular level. Now, they’re not. I figure it’ll take them a little while to convince her that it’s something that’s correctable, with more loving from their man and from each other, but it’s a shock to a young girl who really only has one desire in her life, and that’s to be the mother of some of your children.”

“I ... know she’s said that at different times, but ... we were planning on waiting until they were ready to walk down the aisle at Stanford, so they’d be several months pregnant then. Not now. She’s said she’s not ready.”

“Boys! I raised two of them before figuring out that girls were easier. Then I find out my daughter’s aren’t just regular girls. A woman thinks with her heart, Cal, not with her mind. I’ve spent many an hour talking with my husbands about your first ladies, then about the rest of them as well. The only reason she’s waiting is that she’s afraid that she’s going to be a disappointment to you at some point. The only one who has it worse for you is that Hannah. If you were to walk in there and say you’ve decided that it’s time to put the games aside, and you’re ready to become a God on Earth like Shiva was, they’d both put their robes on to follow you, instantly.”

Elroy spoke up, “Gives a whole new meaning to the phrase, ‘worship the ground you walk on’, doesn’t it? Woman, this chair is comfortable, but not nearly as comfortable as our bed. Do you think we can help our husband to get up and maybe have some of the nice security folks outside drive us home?”

“I don’t need help getting up. Well, physically, yes, a little,” Earl said.

I helped both of them stand up. I opened the door to outside. “Ben? I have two drunk old men and one crazy woman driver that need someone to take them home. Any of our boys or girls able to do that?”

He laughed. “I think we can handle it.” He got on his radio.

Gloria heard my comment. “I’m not a crazy woman driver. I’ve been driving Utes and other vehicles for years before you were born, Mister California Lewis. It’s your damned cars and roads that are crazy.” She smiled. “Holly is staying the night here, to make sure that Lara can help if she’s needed. But nothing else, you hear me, girl?”

From inside the bedroom, Holly hollered out, “No, Mother. I don’t think Toby would like it.”

I paused. “Wait, what?”

“Oh, you were in Florida. They’re boyfriend and girlfriend now. It doesn’t matter that she’s a few years older than he is, they’re both older than their actual years. They’re going to wait until he’s at least 16 before doing anything that way,” Gloria said.

I blinked, then I started laughing.

“Sounds like something from Arkansas. My wife’s sister could be my son’s wife. That would make a grandson also a nephew.”

“Meh. You’re the King, so whatever,” Gloria said. She helped her husbands out to their cars, where drivers had come running up to take them home.

I went back into the house, then into the kitchen and cleaned everything up. Rather than using my speed, I took my time, rinsing glasses and loading the dishwasher, then getting the trash out.

I went into the bathroom and checked on Mike. He’d missed. I checked his sizes, then found something to put on him. I slipped on a bathing suit, then pulled all of his clothes off so they could go through the washer. I made sure the shower temperature was fairly neutral, then picked him up so that I could get him washed off.

I’d seen the extra assholes and zippers that Elroy had earned. Mike’s body took things to a whole new level, making it pretty clear that his body had been subjected to some serious abuse in the past. I saw that he had four healed fractures in his feet, plus a large scar where something had gone through his foot. He was missing one rib on the left side, and the scar along his side showed it hadn’t been taken surgically, but due to something else. There were half a dozen other places where he had bullet wounds.

I got him cleaned up, then dried off, then put the sweats on him.

“I’m done puking, I think. I ... apologize for my behavior. You’ll have my resignation tomorrow for my behavior.”

“You can turn it in, but it’s going to get refused. You’re still my head of security, and just because you had a little too much to drink doesn’t relieve you of that responsibility.”

“I’ve been shot half a dozen times, had a punji stick go through my foot, and had a bouncing Betty go off ten feet from me. Why the hell would I put myself through more injuries when you can’t get hurt?”

“Because it’s your mission. I’m just the principal. There’s five women that are pregnant and going to have my children. I can still only be in one place at one time. And there’s no one on this planet that I’d trust more to guard my family, and to keep them safe.”

He looked like he wanted to argue with me, but I shook my head. “Shut up and carry on with your mission, Major Douglas.”

“Sir, request permission to sleep this off!”

“Permission granted. Dismissed.” I helped him into Toby’s room and put him on the bed. He was asleep before his head hit the pillow.

“I’ve seen both the unclassified and classified reports from his missions in the Pentagon computer files. I also heard what Ben told you outside. Ben was correct, based upon what I’ve seen. There were some members of the CIA that blocked him from getting proper recognition for what he did.”

I took in a deep breath, then sighed. “If you can have it come up so that during a regular review, someone checks it, then do it. Otherwise, leave it alone. I trust that man almost more than I do any of my ladies, and that’s saying a lot. I don’t want to irritate him by making him think I’d done something.”

“I understand,” Mike the computer said.

I walked into our bedroom, where most of the girls were now sleeping.

Beth quietly said, “We’re going to need a bigger bed.”

“We planned this just for the four of us. It was plenty big enough then. It’s sure not, now, is it?”

She shook her head, a sad smile on her face. “Not quite what I pictured when I wanted you to be the big man on campus, to help with the assholes that were bothering the three of us. I know so much now, it makes me wonder at just how naïve and silly a girl I was back then.”

I had to chuckle. “Way back then, so far in the past. August 24^th, barely over four months ago.”

She shook her head, her eyes twinkling. “That was three lifetimes ago.”

“Only three?”

“Tease. Get over here and give me a kiss.”

Dora wasn’t quite as upset the next morning. She was still bothered by what had ended up happening, especially when she realized how Eve had nearly been killed. At the same time, her naturally bubbly personality wouldn’t let her stay depressed.

I’d run Mike’s clothes through the washer and dryer first thing, so that everything from yesterday was at least clean. With them in my hand, I stuck my head into Toby’s room and said, “You feel like a little bit of breakfast before getting dressed for the day? At least your walk of shame is in clean clothes, not stinky ones.”

“I haven’t done that in a long, long time,” Mike said. “It’s been ... years, actually. I’ve been known to have a drink, but getting so knocked on my ass that I couldn’t function in an emergency ... nope, haven’t done that in a long time.”

“Maybe it’s because you needed to let your hair down a little. What little of it there is, of course, since you wear it cut short. And for what it’s worth, you actually felt safe.”

He paused, while putting his pants on. “Safe? Is that what I felt? I thought I was upset, because I’m nowhere near being safe.”

“Not hardly. You’re part of my family. That means someone has to go through me to get to you. What was bothering you was that you found out you aren’t in control.” I held up my hand at his look. “I don’t mean it that way. You’re used to being the biggest, baddest, and meanest dog around. It’s part of your persona, what you had to do to survive when you were in Vietnam, how you’ve run things with your team there.”

He chuckled. “‘Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for I am the meanest son of a bitch in the valley.’”

“Yep. It was driving you nuts, that here’s this nerd that’s not acting like he’s a nerd. This nerd is a super jock, a football hero, attracting women like flies to honey, yet able to engage in not only the highest levels of business and industry, but also deadlier at hand to hand combat than even you are. And not to mention that he’s ruggedly handsome, suave, and debonair...”

“I’ve already puked enough, thank you.”

We both laughed at that.

“You’re the meanest bastard in the valley, but I’m not from the valley, so I’m allowed to be even meaner. You want to know what the kicker is? I don’t really want it.”