Arlene Sanders flipped me the finger; but Fly just looked down at his boots, brushing the mud off with his hands.

11.

Arlene, Albert, and I sat in our little room like old friends. "Albert, you were right," I said. "We should have asked you before charging off to report to Karapetian."

"The fact that you had to sneak around and concoct an absurd fairy tale should have told you something,"

he said, smiling faintly. I caught Arlene looking at him with an interest I hadn't seen in her eyes since she first began getting close to old Dodd. Could she . . . ?

Nah; that was a silly thought. Not with how she felt about religion in general-and Mormons in particu- lar. Not after her brother.

She spoke, her voice tight and controlled. "Albert, can you tell us what on Earth happened? I mean here on Earth."

"Gladly," said Albert.

Evidently, even with only half an invasion force, the urban areas of Earth had fallen quickly. Albert suspected that high-ranking U.S. government officials and their counterparts in other governments, the federal and state agencies and even the services themselves-the U.S. Marine Corps!-actually col- laborated with the aliens.

I guess there wasn't much argument I could make . . . not after seeing living human beings on the march against us in the siege. If I cared to climb up to the roof, I could see them still. I didn't care to.

The monsters promised a peaceful occupation and promised each collaborator that his own government would be given the top command slot. A tried and true approach, with plenty of terrestrial examples: it worked for Hitler and Stalin; now it worked for a bunch of plug-uglies from beyond the planets.

Naturally, the aliens screwed the traitors, killing hundreds of millions . . . utterly destroying Washing- ton, D.C., and demolishing much of New York, Paris, Moscow, and Beijing. The Mormons knew the invad- ers were really serious when all the stock exchanges were wiped out in two hours.

"They control all the big cities now," Albert re- ported.

"So at least some things will feel the same," said Arlene. Our newfound friend laughed uproariously.

He was taking to Arlene's morbid brand of humor.

"What's the Resistance like?" she asked, hanging on his every word. I started to resent her interest.

Maybe I was only her "big brother," but shouldn't that count for something?

Albert turned up his hands. "How should I know?

We know only that they exist, and they have a lot of science types, teenies. They're working on stuff all the time . . . but so far, they haven't been able to shut off the energy wall from outside-and the only way to getto it from the inside is to mount an a.s.sault ... or infiltrate."

"Maybe that's what the President wants us to do," I speculated; I don't think Albert had any more idea than I, though.

Jerry joined us again; now he too was in a dark suit, though still heavily armed with a Browning Automat- ic Rifle. It reminded me of a "Family" war between Mafia soldiers I began to feel distinctly underdressed.

"What about the countryside?" I asked.

Albert nodded and answered: "That's the local resistance, such as it is. At least we are not alone. For a little longer, at least."

Jerry volunteered a comment: "They seem more interested in taking slaves from the rural areas than conquering the territory."

Albert concurred: "It gives us a fighting chance, they being so slow expanding their pale."

"What is this 'special wisdom' the President offered to share before the attack?" I asked. "Can you give us a hint?"

Albert and Jerry exchanged the look of comrades in arms. "Don't worry about it," said Albert. "He's less worried about what you know than what you see."

Albert insisted that Arlene and I rest and bathe.

The only choice offered was a cold shower, but that was fine with us. We found clean clothes.

Then we got the "fifty-cent-tour" from Albert, the tour that wouldn't get him in trouble.

Albert took us down to the hidden catacombs they'd constructed beneath the Tabernacle complex.

The trip began with an elevator ride. The metal was shiny and new. Everything was air-conditioned. The doors slid open to reveal something out of the latest James Bond movie. But somehow I was not surprised at the vast complex they had constructed. We walked under a gigantic V arch to bear witness to dozens of miles of secret shelters. We were not taken behind the locked doors to see the contents, but Albert told us they had millions of rounds of ammunition, stores, heavy military equipment, a whole factory, and more.

It was survivalist heaven.

"I wonder what kind of heavy equipment?" Arlene whispered in my ear.

"Tanks and Humvees," I whispered back. "The rest when he trusts us."

"I'm sure he'll trust us plenty after we've died for the cause," she concluded.

"Can't hardly blame him." I could kick myself for such self-pity, but I couldn't get my stupidity out of my mind.

We took a turn in the pa.s.sageway and reached another elevator marked for five more levels down.

"Jesus!" said Arlene, followed by: "Sorry, Albert."

He only shook his head. Even Albert was probably cutting her some slack for being female. Arlene could always sense a patronizing att.i.tude, but she had too much cla.s.s to throw it back at someone working so hard to play fair with her.

"Why would you have all this?" she asked.He didn't hesitate in answering, "To equalize our relations with the IRS."

"Man, all I had was Melrose Larry Green, CPA,"

marveled Arlene.

"I'll let both of you in on something," he said, "because it hardly matters today. All you saw today were ground troops; but did you know the IRS had its own 'Delta Force,' the Special Revenue Collection Division?"

We shook our heads, but once again I wasn't really surprised. "In case of another Whiskey Rebellion?" I guessed.

"An interesting way of putting it," he said, and continued: "They had an infantry division, two ar- mored cav regiments, a hidden fast-attack submarine, a heavy bomber wing, and from what I hear, a carrier battle group."

Somebody whistled. It was Yours Truly. If the Mormons knew about that, could they have wound up with some of it? This was an obvious thought, and would make full use of an installation this size; but I wasn't going to ask. Arlene and I were lucky to be learning this much.

"How'd they finance it?" I asked.

"The IRS can finance anything?" suggested Arlene, as if a student in school.

"Well, even they had to cover their tracks," said Albert. "Jerry thinks they hid the military buildup inside the fict.i.tious budget deficit. Unfortunately, the Special Revenue Collection Division was seized by the demons."

"Aliens," Arlene corrected, almost unconsciously.

"Whatever."

This seemed a good moment to clear up the nomen- clature: "Actually, Albert, we named the different kinds of aliens to keep them separate. We call the dumb pink ones the demons."

"How did the aliens get their claws on all that IRS equipment?" Arlene asked.

"Hm. Because Internal Revenue was the very first group to sell out Earth," he answered. This was definitely not a day of surprises.

"Do we get to ride on the other elevator?" I asked.

"Later," he said. "And I'm sorry I can't show you behind the doors."

"No, you've been great, Albert," said Arlene. I could tell she was impressed for real, no joke. This was rare. "Why don't you tell us about your checkered military past?"

"That's next on the agenda," he said, "and the President will want to brief you on the mission, if he's picked it yet."

We took the elevator back up to face the boss. I promised myself that no matter how much I wanted to do it, I wouldn't say, "Howdy, pardner."

Three more bodyguards surrounded the President.

These guys didn't seem friendly like Albert or Jerry.

He led us to the auxiliary command center (I sup- posed the real command center was at the bottom level of the complex), where we learned that thenearest nerve center of the alien invasion was Los Angeles. The monsters had set up their ultra- advanced computer services and war technology cen- ter near the HOLLYWOOD sign. I didn't want to ask who sold out humanity there. I was afraid to find out.

The President didn't waste time coming to the point: "Two highly trained Marines who fought the enemy to a standstill in s.p.a.ce, then floated down out of orbit, would be better qualified to lead a certain mission we have in mind than our own people. This is a.s.suming that we haven't been subject to a certain degree of exaggeration. A man and a woman alone could only be expected to do so much against hun- dreds of the enemy."

Arlene was behaving herself, but it dawned on me that I hadn't made any promises to keep my mouth shut. This wasn't about religion. This was about doubting our word after we'd swum through a world of hurt to get this far.

I reminded myself that we needed this man; I reminded myself we'd already hosed the job . . . but stupidity had nothing to do with dishonor!

"If the two of you could get to Los Angeles," the leader continued, "and make it into the computer system, download full specs on their most basic technology, and get it back to the United States War Technology Center, it would aid our defense immeas- urably."

"What's that?" I asked.

"The War Tech Center was created a few weeks ago, hidden-west of here. You'll be told where when the need arises. When you get the download."

I thought for a moment. It couldn't be as far as j.a.pan or China; Beijing and Tokyo were both de- stroyed. He must mean Hawaii.

I couldn't resist being a smart-a.s.s; the President brought that out in people. "It's either Wheeler AFB, Kaneohe Bay Marine Corps Air Station, or Barber's Point Naval Air Station, all on Oahu," I declared.

"Do I win anything?"

"I love Hawaii!" said Arlene. "Great weather.

Hardly any humidity."

"But those prices," I answered.

It was a trivial little protest against the man's pomposity and skepticism, but it made us feel a whole lot better.

"Please," said the President, his face turning posi- tively florid. "As I was saying, if you can penetrate the enemy stronghold and bring the specs to the U.S.

technology center, there are scientists there who can do something with it. We have refugees from ARPA, the Lockheed 'skunk works,' NASA, MacDAC, hack- ers from many places." It sounded to me like the President of the Twelve had been boning up on other subjects besides theology . . . and finance. "Has Al- bert told you about the force field?"

"He said something about an energy wall."

"You have to find a way to shut it off. . . otherwise, you're not going anywhere. You get offsh.o.r.e about fifteen miles, then call an encrypted message in. We'llvector you to the War Technology Center."

''If we can pull this off," said Arlene in her serious, engineer's tone of voice, "and a computer expert can dehack the alien technology, we might come up with shields against them. Defenses, something."

"The first problem is to crack Los Angeles," said the President.

"Then we're your best bet," I said. "After Phobos and Deimos, how bad can L.A. be?" Even at the time, this sounded like famous last words.

"Yes, my point exactly," he agreed languidly, still frosted; "how much simpler this would have to be than the Deimos situation." He paused long enough to annoy us again. "This is more than a two-man operation." Translation: we needed keepers. Well, that was all right with me. "You'll be infiltrating, so we're not talking about a strike force here."

"Stealth mission," said Arlene.

"Two more people would be about right," I said.

The President's first choice was excellent. Albert wanted to go. "By way of apology for being the one to turn you in," he said, holding out his big paw of a hand. I took it gingerly; he hardly had anything to apologize for. He winked.

"If you'd been one fraction less of a hard-a.s.s, I wouldn't want you on this mission anyway."

"This is probably a good time to tell you about Albert's record," said the President. "He was a PFC in the Marine Corps, I'm sure you'll be pleased to hear. Honorably discharged. He won a medal for his MOS." Military operational specialty.

"Which was?" I asked Albert, eye-to-eye.

"A sniper, Corporal," he answered. "Bronze star, Colombia campaign. Drug wars."

"Sniper school?"

"Of course."

"G.o.d bless." said Arlene.

Albert was fine; we both dug Albert. Couldn't say the same about the second choice, who Nate ushered into the ops room: she looked like a fourteen-year-old girl in T-shirt, jeans, and dirty sneakers.

"Fly," Arlene said, staring, "does my promise ap- ply to b.i.t.c.hing about personnel decisions?"

"Say your piece."