"Okay. I guess."

I decided not to tell him that Beast was also covered in blue fur. Why spoil the moment?

"Wow," Stryker said. "One that's not actually a comic book character. Joe Montana?"

"Kevin." I was good. Then again, I knew my source and he knew me. "Good thing I'm around to figure this out."

Big George nodded. "Your C.I.A. file indicated you would be. 'Subject exhibits extreme random tendencies.'"

"What's that mean?" Jeremy asked.

"Means luck," Buchanan said. "And they're not wrong."

"Your C.I.A. file also indicates a strong likelihood to contact the head of the P.T.C.U. for advice and counsel," Big George shared. "It also indicates that you listen to and tend to abide by that counsel."

"Just call me a Mamma's Girl and proud of it."

"Weapon X?" Stryker asked, getting us back on track.

"My daughter, Jamie."

"New Mutants?"

"All the rest of the hybrid babies coming."

"Gambit?"

"Tim."

"You're sure?" White asked.

"If we didn't have Captain America as the guy who's in charge of the files, then I'd say Gambit was James. But considering what Tim did during Operation Confusion, I'm really damned positive."

"Works for me," Stryker said. "You don't have to be right for all of them, but you have to think you're right."

"I'm not even going to ask you to explain that."

Stryker shrugged and went on. "S.H.I.E.L.D.?"

"Claudia, Lorraine, and the flyboys. Len and Kyle. Malcolm. All the people who kick butt with us who aren't the official leaders or extraspecial mutants."

"X-Factor?"

That one I had to consider. Unless I was wrong about my code name being Wolverine, and I really found that hard to believe, I had no clear idea. The X-factor was the unknown, really. Oh. Duh. "Serene."

"Ma and Pa Kent."

"Alfred and Lucinda."

"Indiana Jones."

"My dad."

Stryker snorted. "If you say so."

"My dad's cool, and I do say so."

"Black Widow."

"Speaking of the head of the P.T.C.U. My mom."

"Really? Your father's still alive."

"Yeah, because of my mom, trust me." Black Widow had no real superpowers, she was just totally badass and beyond impressively trained. Just like Mom. Who I desperately wanted to call but now refused to, lest Hacker International get to feel even slightly superior.

"Last one's Nick Fury."

I laughed. "Chuckie."

"He kept a file on himself?" Armstrong asked.

"He's thorough, and he pays attention. And, let's face it, Nick Fury's the Supreme Commander of S.H.I.E.L.D., isn't he?" Of course, I thought of Jeff as Superman, Christopher as the Flash, and Chuckie as Batman, and I was fairly sure Chuckie knew it, because I'd said so in his presence at least once. But this was his code for me to understand, not mine for him.

"Okay, good enough. I'm going to hit the decode. Let's all hope Kitty's right." Stryker hit something on his keyboard. A nearby printer started making a lot of noise.

He got up, raced over, and took a page out of the tray. His whole body relaxed. "That was it. There's a lot more than the ones we went over, Kitty. He might have done everyone in your Embassy; maybe all of Centaurion Division."

"Nice to know he has a hobby that keeps him off the streets. Where is the information on the Avenger Initiative?"

"Waiting for it to print out."

Big George went to another printer. "Who do I give these to?" He had a thick stack of pages in his hand.

"What are they?"

"These are C.I.A's confidential files on all of you."

"Why'd you print them instead of give us to them electronically?"

I got the "duh" look. I was really scoring with that one this weekend. Oh, well, it was probably better than the "you so crazy" look. "I'm ensuring the electronic trail ends here."

Before I could ask about that, I heard a soft mewling and looked into my purse. There was a Poof there. Not Harlie or Poofikins. I was fairly sure it was Jamie's Poof. "Why are you here? Is Jamie alright?"

The Poof purred, so I belayed panic on that front.

"Did Jamie send you?"

Another mewl. Might mean yes. Might mean no. Might mean the Poof was hungry. I couldn't tell.

The Poof jumped out of my purse and onto my shoulder. It nuzzled me, which was always nice. Bruno woke up and came over to stand next to me in that "this one's mine" way all animals seem to have.

"Um, a cuteness break is always appreciated, but we're kind of at DEFCON Universal Soldier here, so if you're here to pass on a message, Kitty needs some help."

The Poof jumped over to White and mewled at him. "I'm no clearer than Missus Martini. Are you requesting reinforcements?"

The Poof heaved a Poofy sigh. It jumped onto the floor in front of Bruno and mewled rather pitifully. A Poof appealing to a Peregrine for help? Apparently wonders never ceased. Or this Poof had no ego attached to asking for assistance.

Bruno warbled nicely at the Poof, then looked at me. Then back at the Poof. Then at me. The Poof. Me.

"Okay, stop giving yourself whiplash. You're right, I forgot something."

"You talk to the giant peacock?" Stryker asked. "And it talks back to you?"

"Later, Eddy."

"What did you forget?" White asked.

"The Poofs asked me to do something for them when they went to find and help Jeff and Chuckie."

"You talk to the Poofs, too?" Stryker asked. "For real and not pretend?"

"Later, Eddy. Like when this is all over later."

"You said you'd try to find the supersoldiers," Jennifer supplied.

"Supersoldiers?" Stryker asked. "You mean Chuck wasn't kidding, they're real?"

"Later, Eddy. Shut up or die, Eddy."

"Are you supposed to find them to stop them from attacking?" Jeremy asked.

"No. To keep them from being destroyed."

CHAPTER 74.

"WHY WOULD THE POOFS want the supersoldiers protected?" Buchanan asked. "They're killing machines of the highest order."

"Killing machines that can help us fight whatever's coming."

"How?" Franklin asked.

"There's a controller for the twelve that attacked us at the President's Ball. We destroyed three of them, but it was amazingly difficult." And had only been achieved because Jeff was high on adrenaline, he and Christopher were enhanced, and Chuckie had figured out how the remote control worked.

"Difficult enough to face space invaders?" Stryker asked.

"I hope we're able to find out." After all, ACE had insinuated that the supersoldiers not being ready was the concern, not that they existed. "Problem is, Chuckie is the only one who currently knows how to control the nine we captured. He may be the only one who actually knows where they are."

"I guarantee James knows," Abigail said. "He's the Head of Field."

"Good point, Abby. Ravi, I need you to multitask."

"Kind of hard, Kitty."

"Ravi, it's the end of the world as we know it if you're actually less good at what you do than what you were when I was in college."

He sighed. "What miracle is it you want me to perform while I continue to try to avoid my head being blown off?"

"I need you to connect with the Dulce Science Center. They're reverse engineering an android we managed to capture yesterday. See if you can help them. More to the point, see if you can figure out where said android called home and where it was 'born' if they're different."

Ravi heaved another martyred sigh. "I need someone to help me with the headset and the phone."

"I'll do it," Jennifer said. Ravi visibly perked up.

"Thanks. So, Eddy, the printer's stopped printing. What does Chuckie actually want us to put into action?"

"Kitty, there's nothing," Stryker said, sounding stressed. "I mean, there's all the data on all of you, but when I get to the part about the Avenger Initiative, all it says is 'go with the crazy.' "

Jamie's Poof jumped up and down. Bruno warbled and flapped his wings.

My brain nudged again. "Nobody say anything. Don't forget whatever it is you're thinking, just don't say anything right now." I took a deep breath, let it out, and focused on the Inner Me. "Big George."

"Yes, Kitty?"

"There are superbeing clusters in Paris and in the Chaco area of Paraguay. I'm sure they passed some form of electronic information. We need it."

"Why?"

"Because we need to find the supersoldiers and the androids and reprogram them."

No one spoke. Waited for the sounds of crickets. Got electronic beeping instead. Same thing, really. Finally Tito, who'd apparently been chosen as Group Spokesperson, opened his mouth. "How?"

"Um, we're standing in the middle of Hacker International. What do you mean 'how?' Will Smith reprogrammed an alien craft in like five minutes in Independence Day."

"Kitty, you do know that's fiction, right?" Stryker asked.

"I point to the alien armada coming to destroy us, my missing husband who happens to be an alien from a different solar system, and the fact that we can travel via the subspatial time warp filtered through black hole technology that is the gates-just for starters, mind you-and say that Independence Day strikes me as more of a blueprint written by someone in the know than a fictional piece."

"She has a point," Franklin said dryly. "I'd also like to mention that we don't have time to nurture the idea of failure. Do what she wants, and do it now."

"Colonel, don't you have to take all this up to higher authorities?" Buchanan asked.

"I do, when I have a credible idea of what to tell them. They know about the impending invasion, believe me."