Clones vs. Aliens (17 page)

The third pirate backed off from its grappling comrades, inclining its head downward. A massive apparatus sprung from its back. Electricity raced across its surface as the weapon charged up.

The now-giant Gemini girls rolled along the ground, trying to tear into the pirates’ armored sides with their massive, perfectly manicured and deadly nails. The pirates fought back with their many appendages, clutching and stabbing at the Gemini with piston-like limbs and grasping claws.

Every time Fisher took a step in one direction, one of the fighters would step or tumble in his way. He twisted in a dizzying circle, looking for an escape route.

Boom.

Fisher once again collapsed to his knees as the middle pirate fired off the enormous weapon affixed to its back. It felt like the noonday sun in August had just popped up, and the hairs on the back of his neck raised, full of static. The Gemini scattered out of the way just in time.

The beam struck the Gemini shuttle dead center. A lengthwise two-foot hole was cored out of it instantly, and the disabled craft crashed to the ground, its lights blinking insanely before going dark with a final whimper.

In the momentary pause that followed the explosion, Fisher ran, reaching the relative safety of the library trailer just as the Gemini, roaring with rage, resumed their attack. Veronica held Fisher tightly when he reached her.

“You all right?” she said hoarsely.

“Amazingly, yes,” Fisher gasped. “The question is, will any of us be when this fight is over?”

Eight of the Gemini ran together and began morphing into a different shape: a solid white ball the size of a small car. The other eighteen Gemini clambered into a pile, similar to a cheerleader’s pyramid, and within seconds had turned into a single giant figure, one with distinct arms, legs, and a head but no other features, like an unfinished statue. It looked like some kind of organic stone, almost polished.

The transformation left enough of a lull in the cacophony of battle that the screams and panicked shouts of the crowd became briefly audible again. The crowd clearly wanted to run, but they were too cowed by the spectacle to budge. They could only hunker down behind the trailers in terror.

The giant picked up the ball with one immense hand, wound up, and threw the glowing projectile at the pirates’ ship. As it spun through the air, it emitted a familiar sound. This time it wasn’t so much like popcorn popping as a line of firecrackers being set off.

Up and up and up it went, directly toward the pirate’s ship.

Before it could make impact, four glittering particle beams stabbed down from the underside of the ship. One blast of energy hit the ball dead-on.

The light from the explosion forced Fisher’s eyes shut, and the shock wave, hitting him a second later, made him stagger to his knees. The ship rocked slightly, and a small area on its underside gave off sparks. Even though the ball hadn’t struck the ship directly, the nearby explosion had been enough to do significant damage.

The pirates retreated to the center of the parking lot.

“Do not think this is over,” the pirate leader said. “There is nowhere you can go where we cannot find you. You
will
return what is ours.” The green beam zipped the three lobsters back up far more quickly than it had set them down, and the ship flew away with a sonic boom.

With thundering engines, the F-16s chased after the pirate ship, heading for the horizon.

Fisher realized he’d been holding his breath and exhaled. The fight was over, and no one had been
harmed—for now. But he knew they’d been lucky. The Gemini shuttle had been destroyed—and that was just a little skirmish. A full-scale battle could be devastating. An all-out war would decimate the planet.

The giant shape shifted back into eighteen girls. The secret was out now. Soon every news agency worldwide would be blaring this story. He wondered if some country would decide not to wait around and launch its own attack on one or both alien species. The possible bad endings to the situation had multiplied hugely.

Dozens of police cars both marked and unmarked pulled into the parking lot, sirens wailing. From one of them, Mr. and Mrs. Bas appeared. They dashed toward their kids.

“Is everyone all right?” Mr. Bas said.

Fisher nodded shakily. “Did you see the explosion?”

“From nearly a mile away,” Mr. Bas said grimly. “If the explosion had occurred on the ground, everything within five blocks of here would be flattened.”

“This is what the secret meeting was about,” Mrs. Bas said, looking up at the sky as if waiting for every other species in the galaxy with a grudge to show up.

“We knew something else had arrived in the solar system,” Mr. Bas said. “But we weren’t sure it was another ship until we got to the Pentagon. We’ve been discussing possible options for dealing with these new aliens.
Frankly,” he scratched the back of his neck, “we didn’t come up with a whole lot.”

“But what we do know, we’re going to go tell the police,” Mrs. Bas said. She smiled tensely at Fisher and Alex. “We’ll see you boys as soon as we’re done.”

There was still a little haze cloud in the sky where the explosion had been. After a moment, Fisher realized there were little burning pieces of the ship’s hull floating down to the ground.

“If they’d used more drones,” Alex said, “the force of the blast could have been enormous. As in,
wiping out Palo Alto
enormous.”

“So far, they’ve been exploding often enough to keep their numbers the same,” Fisher said. “But if they go through a calm period for a while and start eating faster, they’ll generate more and more drones. They could have that kind of power before too long.”

Fisher saw the image in his head. The school flat, everyone he knew buried in rubble. They’d nearly brought the Gemini under control, only to meet these pirates. A situation that had been on the verge of improving now looked like it was going to get far worse. Fisher could still feel that huge ship looming over his head. Where would it appear next? And what could any of them do?

“I was afraid the Gemini were about to start a war
with
us
,” said Fisher. “I didn’t think they were already in one. With space pirates.”

“But what do the space pirates want from the Gemini?” asked Amanda.

“The Gemini have something that belongs to them,” said Alex. “Clearly, something very important. And obviously the Gemini aren’t exactly itching to give it back.”

Veronica blew out a long breath. “The question is, do we pick a side, or do we risk turning
both
sets of angry aliens against us?”

In all of human history there had been not a single recorded instance of contact with an extraterrestrial species—and now Palo Alto had met
two
alien species in a matter of days. In the blink of an eye, the Gemini problem had blown up into the problem of a major potential interstellar war. And now everyone knew what the Gemini were, and what they were really capable of. Without even using any technology, they had damaged a skyscraper-sized space battleship. An explosion hundreds of feet away had almost knocked everyone at Wompalog flat on their backs.

As various traumatized kids and teachers were shepherded into ambulances for routine checkups—or merely made a beeline for their waiting cars—Fisher approached Anna and Bee, who were standing with the other Gemini in the parking lot, examining their nails as though nothing had happened. The closer he got to them, the harder his heart raced—still, he forced
himself to get going, planting himself squarely in front of Anna.

“The pirates spoke of an item you stole from them,” he said, trying to keep the tremor from his voice. “Do you know what they meant?”

“They are pirates,” Anna replied, shrugging. “In their view, whatever they want belongs to them. Clearly, they have decided they want something of ours. We don’t know what.”

“Fisher!” Mrs. Bas jogged across the parking lot, drawing Fisher back from Anna as if worried the drone would spontaneously combust in his face. Which wasn’t exactly an unfounded worry. “It’s, er, time to go home. For
all
of us.” She gestured pointedly to the Gemini’s specially outfitted bus, which had just rumbled up to the parking lot. Fortunately, the Gemini didn’t resist. They turned and, without another word, filed onto the bus.

Fisher, Alex, Veronica, and Amanda rode back in near silence to the Bas house with Fisher’s parents, tailing the gleaming bus as it dodged through side streets. Traffic near the school had ground to a halt as news crews and police vehicles continued to swarm the spot.

Fisher crossed his arms tightly. He knew that if he put his hands somewhere, they’d start twitching and rattling like he was playing an invisible floating piano.

“Do you think it could be the spaceship that they
want?” Veronica spoke up suddenly. “We know the Gemini stole it from someone.”

Mrs. Bas sighed and shook her head. “We don’t think so,” she said. “The spaceship’s interior doesn’t look as though it could accommodate the pirates’ bodies. Whatever they’re after, it isn’t that.” She cleared her throat and exchanged a glance with Mr. Bas. “The
good
news is we have the best and the brightest minds working on the problem.”

If the
best
included Dr. X, Fisher thought darkly, they were in deep trouble.

But only a few minutes later, when Fisher walked through his front door, he saw what his mother meant. Standing in the living room, clearly waiting for them, was a tall man in a dark suit.

“Agent Mason!” Alex cried as they walked into the room. Fisher’s hopes of dealing with the extraterrestrial threats that kept appearing out of nowhere lifted considerably.

“Hello, ladies, gentlemen,” Mason said, smiling. “Seems like you’ve had a busy week.”

“Finally,” asked Alex, detaching Paul from his ankles and dropping onto the couch. Amanda joined him, leaning into his shoulder. Fisher gave the cheerful FP a scratch behind his ears, careful not to disturb the still tender one. “We could have used
assistance
before the Gemini tried to turn the Thanksgiving parade into a fireworks show.”

“I’ve been pretty busy myself,” Mason said. “You should see what a few decades of nuclear testing can do to a diamondback population. But that’s taken care of now. Like my new kicks?” He pointed down at the brand-new pair of snakeskin boots he was wearing. They didn’t exactly match the suit, but they certainly made a statement. And that statement was,
If you are making a list of people to mess with, you might want to leave this man’s name off it.

“And while I was busy in the desert, my colleagues have been busy tracking the new ship,” said Agent Mason. “Astronomers detected it coming into the solar system a few days ago. We think the pirates were tracking the Gemini. The M3 beacon helped the Gemini to find us … and the pirates to find
them.
The pirates are keeping very close tabs on the Gemini. They haven’t even left the West Coast.”

“Where’s the pirate ship now?” Fisher asked. He felt a fresh shot of adrenaline slip into his bloodstream.

“Hovering over the Pacific, close enough to San Francisco to be visible to the naked eye from Fisherman’s Wharf,” Agent Mason said, his expression grim. “We’ve got jets patrolling the Bay twenty-four-seven, but there’s no way of knowing how much damage they could do even if we deployed them. The ship hasn’t answered any attempts at contact. What we need to do is get someone on that ship. Unfortunately, since it’s floating in midair,
it’s impossible to sneak up to undetected. We’d have to trick them into letting someone aboard.”

Fisher considered the problem for a moment. If the pirates weren’t responding to radio contact, there wasn’t much reason to think that they’d want to talk to a human. Of course, it wasn’t the
humans
they were here for in the first place…

Agent Mason was staring at Fisher, like an expectant teacher waiting for a particular result. It was obvious that he already had a solution to propose.

“The pirates want to deal with the Gemini,” Alex said slowly, puzzling it out. He looked up, smiling. “So why don’t we give them Gemini? And in their preferred human form … 
twins.
” He put a hand on Fisher’s shoulder.

“You’re not seriously …” Veronica began, wide-eyed.

“He is seriously,” Amanda said, sighing. “Trust me. And, much as I hate to say it, I can’t really think of a better idea.”

Fisher opened his mouth but all that emerged was a squeak. Going in disguise as one alien species to negotiate with another alien species? It was crazy. It was completely crazy. That said … it might just be the best idea they had.

In fact, it might be the
only
idea they had.

“That is exactly what I had in mind,” Mason said with a proud smile.

“What??” said both Bas parents in unison.