Kitty Katt 11: Alien Separation (35 page)

“I
'M KIND OF WITH JAMES,
Fancy. Do you consistently meet no resistance when you raid?” A fighting force that never had to fight wasn't necessarily a good fighting force. Practice, versus talking about or thinking about a skill, tended to make perfect.

“This is an old and unused wing.”

“How can it be old if it's only been here two of your years?”

“The castle has been on our world for much longer, Shealla. The king took it over, he did not build it.”

“Really? When was this castle built?” I examined the stone. It looked something like granite. I hadn't seen stone like this on the planet yet.

“It has been here since our world began,” Fancy said. “The Father of the Gods created it. But it used to reside elsewhere.”

“Where and how did it get moved?” Reader asked before I could.

“The castle used to be in what you are calling the Bronze Land. Zenoca put it here. Zenoca carries the Jewel of the Gods, and therefore he can make things appear or disappear.”

Was pretty confident that the Jewel of the Gods was a Z'porrah power cube. The missing Z'porrah power cube to be exact. I hadn't realized they could move gigantic buildings but LaRue would definitely know how to work one better than any of us did.

Algar wanted that power cube found, too. He was really getting at least a double, if not a triple or even a home run, on this particular excursion of ours.

“Didn't anyone question that?” Reader asked. “Especially when Zenoca shoved someone who's not from this planet into the ruling position?”

“They did not realize it was Zenoca. He appeared as a woman and convinced the others that a ‘strong king' was what we needed. I know Musgraff believes that woman was Zenoca, and I do as well.”

“Make it three, because I'm certain that was Zenoca.”

“Yeah, it makes sense,” Reader said. “Does anyone else think Zenoca put the king on the throne other than the outcasts and those in Haven?”

“Zanell does,” Fancy replied. “And some others. But now to question the king is to be thrown out of your clan. Just as to contradict the king ensured that Musgraff and all those who now follow him would be outcast.”

“What was their contradiction, exactly?” I asked.

“They said they had seen ships in the sky. The king said this was impossible, that we are alone here in space. When they insisted that they had seen wonders, the king called them liars. When they did not admit to a lie, the king cast them out.”

“I didn't notice a lot of pilgrims on the way up or down the All Seeing Mountain. Is that normal?”

“No, Shealla. But right now, the king does not like us to go there. Only the most devout are traveling the Seven Paths to Pilgrimage right now.”

Meaning the king knew there were so many ships in his solar space that all his people would soon know they were there, and therefore he'd either have to admit the ships' existence or banish every subject.

“So, here's a question. Why did Zenoca move the castle? Or, rather, what's more special about Greenland than the Bronze Lands?”

Fancy shook her head. “No reason was given. The people did ask—but we were told that the king could do as he pleased. And the display of power cowed most of the people.”

“Understandably.”

“Kitty, you said the Bronze Land dampened Jeff's powers,” Reader pointed out. “Remember who we think is king here now. He's got troubadour and mind control powers, if it's really Ronaldo. Meaning he wouldn't want those constricted.”

Things clicked. “That both makes sense and explains how they figured out that something in the Bronze Land region would dampen A-C talents. LaRue moves the castle to a more congenial location for Ronaldo and brings back Anti A-C Power Dust to Earth.”

“Which begs an important question,” Reader said. “Which is this—did Zenoca move the hidden tunnels as well?”

Fancy looked pensive. “I saw the magic and my people did as well. The entire castle glittered golden, disappeared from its original location then reappeared here. Zenoca was in the castle when it moved, but so were all clan leaders, myself included. Our people were outside and could confirm the miracle. Zenoca and the king had not visited the castle long before they insisted it be moved—they had spent their time prior explaining why we were in danger, and those talks took place in Zanell's land.”

“Did they ever enter Haven?” Reader asked.

“No, I did not trust Zenoca in his female form or our new king, so I did not allow them entrance or even discuss where and how my people lived.”

“Wise. The power cubes work on mental suggestion, James. Meaning that if LaRue wanted to move ‘all' the castle, that would include underground and secret areas, too. She might have done so just to save time, and she also could have done it without being more specific.” Especially if Algar was watching and offering a little “help.”

“And you think Ronaldo hasn't examined the place since then?”

“I think that he might have, but if this area looked boring or confusing—or he almost lost his head due to a spear or something, that he might have stopped. He's not brave, remember. He's just a bastard, in every sense of the word.”

The castle had clearly been created by Algar. Meaning that the traps were there both to keep interlopers out but, more importantly, to keep Ronaldo and his people away from the paths that let Fancy and hers in. A being who could get our pictures and a ginormous telescope in place thousands of years before we existed could certainly make a castle that fooled Ronaldo and LaRue.

Fancy put up her paw. “We're approaching the end of this stairway. Once we leave it, James, you will find more people. Many more. The ocellar and the chocho must stay quiet, and we must as well, or we will all die.”

We nodded, and I whispered the Stay Silent instructions to both Wilbur and Ginger, both of whom said they'd control themselves.

Fancy crept forward, looked around, motioned with her paw, and scurried off. The rest of us followed.

Could hear the sound of people walking and talking, though it was far off. Could also finally see daylight, meaning there were windows and we were again aboveground. Looked up. The windows here were high up, just like the ceilings, open, with nothing hanging over them. Clearly we weren't in an area of this place where anyone lived.

We continued on, stopping, looking, scurrying, and, in some cases, just avoiding someone. I was lost beyond belief and stopped even trying to figure out where we were, where we'd been, and how we could go back. The castle was even more of a maze than the old secret tunnel area had been.

Smelled food of some kind cooking and my stomach growled. Hoped it had growled quietly. Waterfruit were fine, but they weren't real food, and it had been a long time since we'd eaten.

Fancy heard my stomach and flashed me a smile. “We go through part of the kitchens,” she whispered in my ear. “We can grab food along the way.”

Sure enough, our next stop was what looked like a pantry. Long room with doors on either end and also in the middle of each long wall. Shelves loaded with foodstuffs everywhere else. We crept through here, but everything was an ingredient—nothing was prepared.

However, our goal was the middle door on our left. Once there, Fancy did the usual stop, listen, open a crack, listen, lather, rinse, repeat thing. She finally opened the door and we all trotted inside.

We were in the roasting room. Literally. There were different kinds of meats on spits, and the smell of roasting meat, and it was as hot a Pueblo Caliente in the middle of summer.

“What kinds of animals are these?” I asked Fancy as she headed toward a spit near the back of the room.

“None you have met. Greenland in particular is filled with game animals. It and the Blue Waterway feed the majority of our planet.”

“And there's another reason to move the castle here,” I said to Reader as Fancy grabbed what looked like a bird of some kind and tore it apart. It was too small to be Bruno, for which I was extremely thankful. My Peregrine was here, and that meant he was in danger just like everyone else. And I knew without asking that Ronaldo would enjoy eating my pet if he could ensure I got to watch.

Reader nodded. “Control the food, control the people.” He took a bite of the leg Fancy had handed him. “Tastes like chicken.”

“It is chicken,” she said. “The king brought chickens with him. They are the most remarkably stupid animals I have ever encountered.”

“That's chickens.” Ate my leg with relish. “But this confirms it's who we think it is. I doubt chickens show up all over the cosmos.”

“And apparently they're Ronaldo's favorite food. Not sure how that helps us, other than getting us fed, but I'll take it.”

All five of us devoured the chicken in record time. Fancy found a cloth that we all used to wipe hands and faces, while Ginger and Wilbur merely licked their chops. Then, sustenance managed, we headed off again.

“I still feel like we're in a video game,” Reader muttered. “We earned our food and rest break, and now we get to go on, fortified for the next battle.”

Fancy slipped us out through another door that led to the roasting room, and we were back in yet another corridor. Once more we crept and scurried along, and finally reached a small door.

Fancy listened at said door and did the usual rigmarole. We went inside. Small door, small room.

There was no apparent reason for this room, other than that there was another door on the opposite side.

“What's this?” Reader asked softly.

“Antechamber to the king's throne room.”

Reader and I exchanged a look. “Get ready, girlfriend. It's about to stop being easy in three . . . two . . . one . . .”

Fancy opened the door.

“W
OW,
James, color me impressed with your prescience.”

The space in front of us was filled with what looked like Ancient Amazonians. But there were some regular Amazons from Beta Twelve in there, too. Nice to know where those who'd followed Lilith and Kyrellis had ended up.

Heard a click behind me. Raced to the door we'd come through. It was now locked. Sure, I could have used my extra A-C strength to pull it open, but why bother? It was a safe bet that there were just more soldiers of some kind out there.

“Do come in,” a cheery voice called to us. It was a voice I recognized. “We've been waiting for you.”

“Well, how can we refuse such a nice invitation?” Zipped back and stepped in front of Fancy, handing her Ginger as I did so. Decided Algar wasn't going to be offering much advice via my iPod in this circumstance so took all that off and dropped it into my purse. Then I walked through the threshold.

That it was Ronaldo Al Dejahl sitting on a really ostentatious and overwhelmingly gaudy throne wasn't a surprise. That there were a lot more Amazons and Ancients around than was probably healthy for us was also no surprise. That no one else we were looking for was in here with him was the big surprise.

Knew I looked shocked, and had to figure the others did, too. But, happily, Ronaldo wasn't the brightest bulb on the Hanukkah bush. “Surprised to see me and all my friends?” he asked gleefully.

“Um, yeah. Yeah we are.” Not. Waited for a reaction—there was none. His power was mind control—at least the original Ronaldo had that trait, along with his troubadour talent—but not necessarily mind reading. But looking at the Ronaldo on The Chair of Ugly Chairs, had a distinct feeling that Chuckie's fears were groundless—as far as I could tell, this was indeed a clone.

Of course, I'd seen more of the clones than Chuckie had, so I could tell that there was just something slightly off about this Ronaldo. He didn't look quite right—something was subtly wrong. Couldn't put my finger on what or why, but I got the distinct feeling that he was a copy of the original.

As I remembered from the last time I'd seen him, he was typical A-C handsome. He was older than Serene but not by too much, about Jeff's size, with dark hair. When we'd met, he'd been mid-twenties. He didn't look much older than that now. But while he looked the way I remembered, there was something missing.

As he grinned at me, I realized one thing that was missing—recognition. He didn't look like he remembered meeting me—or threatening to make me brain-dead then rape me repeatedly so that I could birth all his children while in a coma. There was evil glee in his expression, but no real malice. The Original Ronaldo had come up with a lot of malice when he'd wanted to. Decided my gut, like Reader's, was rarely wrong and just went with it.

Sadly, the cloning process our enemies used meant that the clone had all the memories that the original had. At least, as long as the original or clone du jour had downloaded their brain into the cloning system.

Then again, the last time we'd seen the real original Ronaldo, Jeff had beaten him literally almost to death for a variety of reasons, threatening to make me brain-dead and then rape me being only two of them. And if this clone had been put in place prior to LaRue the First being killed, then that meant he'd been put in place prior to Ronaldo the Maybe Original returning to Earth, as well, and possibly also before Ronaldo the Maybe Original had taken his beatdown. But that would mean that he had a separate memory stream from that point on.

Thought about the Ronaldo Gladys had killed—he'd entered her mind so easily, so deeply, and yet, prior to Operation Infiltration, he'd never really tried. He'd controlled an entire facility full of A-Cs and humans, including Gladys, during Operation Confusion but he hadn't done more than just keep them acting like sheep. His mind control during Operation Infiltration was far more advanced. This could have been the Evildoer Society upping their game . . . or there could have been another reason.

“What are you doing here?” Reader asked, presumably because he'd made the leap, too, and realized that Ronaldo wasn't clear about why we were all shocked. This gave me time to keep on thinking. Yay, Bizarro World, for forcing me to try to think without speaking.

My mind was whirring at its own version of hyperspeed, helped, no doubt, by what I considered real food. What if the Original Ronaldo had been so close to dead after his beatdown that, even though Original LaRue took him off the planet, he couldn't be saved? That would mean she'd had to have cloned the original well before she'd found the Z'porrah, or, at least, before they all hit Earth again to try to destroy us.

If she hadn't cloned Ronaldo prior to the start of Operation Confusion, then the clones she'd made of him wouldn't necessarily have his memories. They'd know what she'd told them, and maybe she'd downloaded Ronaldo's brain in advance, but that download would be missing all the information that happened afterward. This would be the best-case scenario for us. Therefore, it was probably the most unlikely. Not impossible but, the way our luck ran, improbable. Of course, the man in the Butt Ugly Chair sort of said we were lucking out. Maybe.

So what if she'd cloned Ronaldo before Operation Confusion, and therefore even before Jamie was born? After all, they'd cloned Leventhal Reid, and his death predated Operation Confusion by a good year. The LaRue and Reid clones we'd met during Operation Infiltration had indicated they weren't cloning others beyond themselves and the Mastermind. But maybe that's because they already had, or felt that once the Ronaldo Clones were used up they wouldn't need any more? Or maybe Original LaRue hadn't shared with the others that she'd made Ronaldo Clones, and that would mean that LaRue 2.0 wouldn't share that, either.

Original LaRue had spent time on Alpha Four during Operation Confusion. A lot of time. And she had a power cube, meaning she could have easily left the planet and gone to this one and no one would have noticed. For all we knew, there was a cloning facility here. And my guess was that it was with the snakipede pens or cloning facility or whatever they were using to create those monsters. Who would even try to find something those things were protecting?

So, I could take as a working hypothesis that she'd made a couple of Ronaldo clones, just in case. When she'd made them was still iffy, but proof that at least one existed was sitting in front of me. LaRue was a long-term planner, after all.

Also safe to say that the real Ronaldo had been brain-dead or so badly damaged after Jeff's beatdown that, A-C or not, he wasn't worth it to fix or she couldn't fix him. So she installed her most ready Ronaldo Clone on this throne, and left him to keep her interests safe in this solar system.

Then it's off to the Z'porrah home world in her stolen hyperdrive spaceship with another Ronaldo clone in tow. This one, however, maybe they tinkered with. Increased his mind control powers, just in case. After all, the Z'porrah weren't going to stay on Earth. Earth was probably going to be the prize LaRue and Ronaldo got to keep. So, ensure that your man is able to use his mind control even better than before, because a few were able to avoid and ignore said powers in the past.

LaRue was accidentally shot by Esteban Cantu during Operation Infiltration. And it was likely that she hadn't had time to download her memories into her cloning facility on Earth, because they had no time to do so between landing impressively and her being shot. Maybe she'd had time to download before she'd taken off for galactic parts unknown, but she'd been off the planet when Operation Confusion went down, so it was unlikely that she'd done an upload.

Meaning that the Mastermind's team on Earth, the LaRue Clone included, might not know that a Ronaldo Clone was on this planet, running things, or that the guy who came back to Earth with LaRue was also a Ronaldo Clone. The LaRue Clone might not even know that there was a Ronaldo Clone on this planet. But that wasn't a sure enough bet to assume.

Clarence Valentino might have known, since he went to the Z'porrah home world with them, but he was dead now, and his loyalty would have been to LaRue and probably the Z'porrah. She was the one who'd saved him, after all. Even though Cliff had saved him after Operation Destruction, why give up your only ace in the hole? Even Clarence hadn't been that loyal or that stupid. Close, of course, but not quite. And if he'd told Cliff about a Ronaldo clone, then Clarence would have had no one to run to, and I knew for a fact that he hadn't been the kind of guy to go it alone, ever.

But would he have told the LaRue clone? When we “met” her she was about twelve in terms of maturity. Meaning that the chances were extremely slim that Clarence would have told a child about all the things he knew that she didn't. He'd probably planned to, but I'd killed him before she was old enough and he'd had the chance. The likelihood was high that LaRue 2.0 on Earth had no idea that this Ronaldo was on this planet or that the Ronaldo who was instrumental during Operation Infiltration wasn't the real deal.

On Bizarro World, LaRue hadn't told Cliff she was an alien. We'd never seen any indication of her shapeshifting on Earth, so maybe the Cliff in this universe also didn't know. Meaning the Cliff in this universe also might not know that there was a Ronaldo Clone, let alone that he was sitting on the throne of Beta Eight.

“I'm ruling my world,” Ronaldo 2.0 said, still cheerfully. “What are you doing sneaking in here?”

“Taking your world away from you.” Hey, why waste time with verbal gymnastics? Things were falling from the sky and meant that, in short order, others would be here to do the same. Only I was prepared to defend this world and its inhabitants and I knew without asking that The Clone King was not. He was prepared to welcome the Z'porrah, and that meant he was also willing to let every other creature on this world die. Louie the Lizard and his kind and the snakipedes might have a shot with the Z'porrah, but everyone else on the planet was going to be Dino Chow unless we prevented it.

Ronaldo smirked. “Just how are all of three of you and a couple of pets going to do that?”

Took a look around the room. We were easily outnumbered five to one. Had to assume anyone here was an Ancient traitor—of which they either had an amazing amount or most of them were clones—or a Beta Twelve traitor, because there was no way Queen Renata was in on this.

But it always paid to be sure. Looked at one of the Amazons. “Your queen has allowed you to follow a man's rule?”

She smirked. “Our queen is unfit to rule.”

“Ah, that old wheeze again. You all believe that?” I asked the room in general.

Ronaldo's grin went wider as all the female heads nodded. In far too much unison for the Amazonian Ancients. They were clones for sure. Usha's clones, maybe. But while there were a lot of similarities, they didn't really look like exact copies of her.

“Where's Usha?” I knew where the one I'd met was, and I also knew where the one Reader and the others had killed was.

All the Ancient Amazonians smirked. The exact same smirk at the exact same time. Smirking was the thing in this room, apparently. “Around,” the spokesclone said.

“Around where? I ask because you all look a lot like her.” Actually, now that I'd examined them some more, they didn't. They looked like the dead one. But I didn't know her name.

Group shrug. This was freaky. The whole Multiple Man thing was great, but all the clones I'd met so far were independent thinkers. With these, I didn't get that impression. The Free Women who were here didn't look freaked out. But, thankfully, they also didn't look like carbon copies of each other, either.

“Nearby,” the spokesclone said with another smirk that was duplicated by all the others.

“Yeah? Because at least two of you aren't nearby. One's dead and one's captured.”

All the eyes narrowed. “What do you mean?” the spokesclone asked.

“Where are my warriors?” Had to figure someone we were looking for was here, and warriors was a nice word that covered everyone.

“Who wants to know?” one of the other smirkers asked. Was shocked as hell until I realized it was a Free Woman, not an Ancient Amazonian.

“The person who's going to end all of you and save them.” No time like the present to see if I had the backup I thought I did or not.

They all laughed and assumed fighting stances. The Ancient Amazonians' stances were exactly the same, the Free Women's were similar but slightly different from each other.

“I think you're going to have to prove that,” Ronaldo said with a happy laugh. Had the strong suspicion that he'd been brought along too fast because he sounded like he'd been eating at the Cray-Cray Buffet for a long time. Didn't know if that was going to help us or not, but until proven otherwise, my working hypothesis was that Ronaldo 2.0 was as mad as a bag full of hatters.