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Jenny watched Tidbit sunning himself on the window seat. Like Leonora, Jenny hated waiting. It wasn't that she didn't have anything to do, but Burt had headed out with Brendan, Bob, Xao Ting and Leland on the hunt for the Groga, based on Burt's locators. Even though she knew there was no way they could have gotten to them in the Louisiana swamp where they had located them. There was no way they could have even found them by now, much less hatched a strategy.
The house had been swept and the ruined furniture had been removed. Her old camping cooler was the only thing to sit on in the house, at this point. Burt had assured her that all repairs would be made, and furnishings would be provided by the time she had time to return. She was glad she had put clothing and hygiene supplies into the MDP on her last trip.
She had taken some of the time to set up her camping cot in the bedroom for a temporary place to sleep and had gone out and bought some paper plates and cups as well as some freezer dinners, sandwich supplies and some fruit. Burt had told her to resupply her food stocks when the clean-up crew was finished with the place, as anything that did get left behind would be suspect.
She had put Lova, Mustapha and Aliki on the team for organizing and logistics, interacting with Burt's team for keeping track of strategy. She had explained that she would be keeping the rest of them in reserve to have access to their skills as stage one of the operation to find Sam's minions moved forward. She sent the Guardians who could be spared back to their gates with instructions to report anything out of place or unusual as they went about their duties.
Tarafau would have been a real resource for Burt's team, except that for now he was Tidbit. In a few minutes she would retire to the gate study, as Alliance Agents would be coming through her gate with the express purpose of protecting her and Tidbit. This made her feel like less of an asset and more of a burden to the team, but Lova had pointed out that she was a vital key to the success of their mission and every general she had ever read about had bodyguards and aides de camp. Though she understood their reasoning, it had done little to assuage her thought that they would have been much better prepared if someone else had been in charge, even with the guidance and direction of Tarafau, Lova and Burt.
She had been surprised how business-like Burt had been as they had conferred about what to do next. She was very used to thinking of him as a smart aleck kid near to her own age, but he had been working with the Alliance since he was a teen, having stumbled into things that did not concern him. Lova said he had taken to the Alliance training like a bird to the wing, and he knew things about this kind of warfare that surprised her.
Jenny couldn't help but grin when she thought of him, however. She was learning that even with his seemingly casual attitude, he was a sensitive and kind person and there was something about his smile that warmed her heart.
Lova had revealed that she also had a military background and had been an officer over troops. Jenny could imagine this easily, considering the matter of fact way she directed everything at the Sanglarka training center.
Tarafau had been around when the original Groga raids had come up before, so he had valuable information as to what Burt's team should expect. Having fought them before, he knew strategies that had worked in the past.
The team had worked from the chart that had assembled itself during their conference with the other Guardians. It was obvious there was a wide range of skills to choose from and none of the weaknesses any of them had admitted to needed to be a barrier, depending on how they did assignments.
Once they had given the assignments and the others had departed, Lova had seen Jenny, Tarafau, Burt, Bob and Xao Ting off through the L.A. gate with hugs and assurances that her team would stay in close touch.
Burt's team had run off in Bob's car to depart for the airport to Louisiana, where Burt's bugs currently resided, and Jenny had been left with Tidbit to await her Guard detail.
"You coming?" she asked Tidbit, as she began to head for the gate office. Tidbit looked up with his lamp-like eyes. "I should be there to greet them," he agreed.
The green light above the gateroom door lit up after they had been there only a few minutes. It was nice to know that her Guards were punctual, she thought wryly.
To her surprise, the three who stepped out of the portal were humanoid and female.
"Lyra, Nona and Mynn," said the first one who had stepped through the gate, pointing to each of them in turn. "You are Jenny and Tidbit and we are your Guard."
Jenny noticed they were dressed in what her dad had called "civvies", no uniforms.
"We're your cousins from Arizona," Lyra said with a smile. "We'll be your guests for awhile. Our rental car will be arriving in the night, while your neighbors are sleeping, and, in the morning, your neighbors will be none the wiser. Just say we caught the red-eye. We know your cover is blown for Engoza's henchmen, but we still want your neighbors to think that everything is normal here.”
The three women couldn't have been any more different than one another. Lyra was a short curly-haired blonde with pale skin and big blue eyes. The top of her head just came up to Jenny's shoulder. Nona was a few inches taller than Jenny and her skin was only slightly lighter than Tarafau's with black hair pulled back into a knot at her neck. Her eyes, surprisingly, were also blue, almost aquamarine. Her height made Lyra look even shorter, if possible. Mynn's short brown hair was straight and spiky and her eyes were brown as hot fudge. She was about Jenny's height and had a mischievous glint in her eyes.
"Hey, Tidbit!" Mynn said, reaching down to scratch behind his ears. "I hear you've been in a cat fight that you didn't win, lately. I didn't think that was possible."
"It is, when your opponent sneaks up from behind and knocks you on the back of the head," he sent grumpily.
"Tish posh, you silly old cat. What happened to those reflexes like lightning?"
Tidbit laid his ears back and stalked out of the open door into the house, his tail waving behind him in indignation, not deigning to reply.
"I'm not sure where to put you three," Jenny said, uncomfortably. "I guess you could camp out in my home office. There's nothing in there now. Not even any furniture."
"Not to worry," Nona said, "We are equipped." And she tapped the MDP on her wrist.
"OK, I'll leave you to it then. Make yourselves comfortable. I'll make us some lunch. If you'd like we can eat it in the garden."
The three nodded their assent and went into the office.
While Jenny put together some sandwiches and a tall pitcher of cold water with orange slices in it, she mulled over what it would be like to have so many people in her little house for an extended period of time. The last time she had had a roommate had been Sam, in their tiny little apartment off campus.
She flinched at that thought and touched the still tender butterfly cut into her flesh. She was sure she could trust these women. They were, after all, Alliance Agents. But the hurt had been so much more than the physical torture Sam had put her through. She felt violated and used, feelings she had heard others talk about, but something she had never fully understood.
It was true, what her mother had always told her, that oftentimes the pains of the heart were much more hurtful than any physical injury.
Her guards finished setting up their bedroom quickly and joined her out on the patio, bringing out a couple of dining room chairs, so they all had a place to sit around the little wrought iron table. They oohed and aahed over the little herb garden and the koi pond, setting Jenny at ease, instead of the other way around.
"So, while we're here, is there anything we can do to assist you?" Lyra asked.
Jenny thought about it. There was still the issue of the storage shed. She had put it off for way too long. Sam had been really focused on it, as if she knew there was something important in there. Perhaps she had only thought it was the gateway, but Jenny didn't think so.
She told them about the shed and Sam's strange behavior in front of the door, including the exploding trap she had laid for her there. They listened attentively.
"I'm glad you waited for us to do this," Lyra said. "We have some tools that may make this safer. Just because you disabled one trap, doesn't mean you caught them all. Your 'Sneaky Sam' sounds like a conniver to me. I'm betting she had more than one trick up her sleeve. Stay here."
Mynn stayed with Jenny while Lyra and Nona started a slow circuit around the shed in opposite directions, holding their hands up, palms extended toward the building, as Burt had done. When they met again where they had started, in front of the shed door, they nodded at one another and returned to sit down at the table.
"There's a net around the shed," Nona said. "Its purpose isn't clear. It may have been put there by your aunt or by Sam. There is no way for us to know. However, if it was put there by your aunt, you may be able to question LizzieAI about it." She noted the shock on Jenny's face as she realized she hadn't told them about LizzieAI. "We were briefed before we came about your training and resources," she said simply.
Jenny pulled her tablet out of the MDP. "What can I do for you today, Jenny?" came LizzieAI's cheerful voice. Jenny quickly outlined their dilemma, pointing the tablet camera at her three guards. "Ah, I see. Stand in front of the door and say, "The Cat's Pajamas" and the net will come down. It is mostly there for surveillance purposes anyway, but there are things it won't allow you to remove from the unit unless it is disabled. I suggest you don't disable it unless you intend to take something out of it."
Jenny decided they may need to take some things out of the shed, especially if it might help them in their quest to eliminate the Groga. She said clearly, "Cat's Pajamas". She noticed nothing, but took out her key to the shed door and opened it. She couldn't help remembering the flash of Sam's trap when Burt had sprung it. Nevertheless, nothing happened.
As they entered the shed, the lights sprang up and the seeming chaos inside was exactly as Jenny had remembered it the one time she had taken a moment to go inside. At the time it had been overwhelming to even consider going through all of this, and it seemed that hadn't changed. Jenny's insides were in a knot thinking of how much stuff there was to go through and there seemed to be no particular order to any of it, which seemed a little out of character for Lizzie.
As she recalled, there were two rooms. The front part of the shed appeared to be the furnishings and decorative items from the house that the executor of the will had moved out to make room for Jenny's things. When she got to the door that went through to the other part of the shed, however, it was locked. Jenny tried the outside door key, but it didn't fit. She took out her tablet again. "Um, Lizzie, how do I get through the second door?"
"Oh, sorry, Jenny. The key is taped under the desk drawer. You should find the desk somewhere in the first section."
Sure enough, after a quick search they found the desk and on the underside of the main drawer was taped a key which fit perfectly.
The door opened into a warehouse type space, very similar to the one inside the MDP, except not so large. This was not an interdimensional space, such as Jenny has suspected it might be. It was only as big on the inside as it appeared to be on the outside.
This felt more like a space her aunt would create. Orderly and clean. The tall metal utility shelves were labeled. and each thing, most of which Jenny did not recognize, appeared to have its own space. Lyra, Mynn and Nona looked around with delight.
"There's enough tech here to equip a whole platoon," Nona said in tones of wonder. "How many missions had she completed in her 60 some earth years in the Alliance? It seems like she was involved in way more than just tending her gate."
Jenny thought of the photo she thought of as "the safari" of Lizzie and Tarafau smiling exultantly at the camera. She had since visited that spot. It was the outside of the building that had housed Miriha's gate. She was now certain that Lizzie hadn't spent as much time at her gate as she had initially assumed.
"Is there anything we can use once we have found the Groga here on earth?" Jenny asked.
"Oh yes," enthused Mynn. She cocked her head, considering. "Of course, it depends on the terrain and our need to not attract the attention of the locals. But there are definitely some things we can use that will even the odds, depending on what the odds are, naturally."
"Naturally," Jenny agreed with a twist to her mouth. It seemed that everyone knew so much more than she did.
"You three know what all of these things are. Do you see anything that doesn't seem to belong or that might be key to something the Groga may be planning?"
Lyra looked around for a moment. "You know, this may take awhile. Nona is our specialist in weaponry tech. I think Mynn and I will sit out in the garden for a bit." And suiting actions to words, she and Mynn headed out the door.
Jenny's look at Nona was a question.
"They want to be sure no one comes at us while we're occupied," she said. "Come on, let's take a look."
"Take out your tablet and get a photo of each shelf and their contents so we can look at it in more detail later," she advised. "The LizzieAI will be able to give us a commentary on each one in the comfort of the gate office, to be sure we are secure. In the meantime, I will look at the shelves behind you and see if anything stands out."
This sounded like a good plan and a lot faster than going over every single thing on every single shelf. Jenny proceeded to follow her instructions as Nona went from shelf to shelf behind her, seemingly murmuring to herself, keeping up a running commentary.
"Wow, that's an old model. I didn't know they still made them," she said at one point, picking up what looked like an oddly shaped rifle with a solid barrel. She saw Jenny looking at her. "Energy weapon," she said, answering Jenny's unspoken question. "About 20 years behind current tech, but a nice piece of work nevertheless."
They continued to scan the shelves. Jenny was amazed at the variety of things on the shelves. There were even some regular books on one set of shelves. She came to a tray of what looked at first like watchbands until she recognized them. "Nona, look! Are these what I think they are?"
"MDPs!" Nona's intense blue eyes lit up like a Christmas tree. "I wonder if they have anything in them?"
Jenny picked one up and thought, "peek" and suddenly she saw before her endless shelves of tech, supplies and even a couple of the hovercars like she had ridden in to the Alliance headquarter building.
"Jackpot!" she said, scooping them all up. "Let's just get these shelves photographed and retire to the gate office."
Nona nodded, saying not another word. They finished photographing the shelves and left, locking the door and putting the keys into her MDP.
Lyra and Mynn were lounging, apparently completely relaxed, sipping from their glasses of what was probably now just warm, orange-flavored water. They stood immediately and followed Jenny and Nona quickly into the house.
"You coming, cat?" Mynn called out to Tidbit. "You might want to see this. Jenny and Nona have found something."
As they shut the door to the gate office behind them and Tidbit curled up in his bed, Jenny laid the MDPs, 5 of them, on the desk before her.
Lyra and Mynn gasped. "Are they full?" Mynn asked eagerly.
"One of them is. I haven't checked the rest. Could this be what Sneaky Sam was looking for?"
"I wouldn't be surprised," said Nona. "If all of these are full, anyone could supply an entire army, depending on what's in them."
Jenny agreed. "I think Lizzie must have keyed them to me, since I was able to peek into the one I looked at. Can I transfer that key or add you three to be able to access these? If they are full, this is five warehouses of stuff. It'd take me years to catalog it all."
"Unless of course, the catalog is in LizzieAI," Lyra said, rolling her eyes, as if it was so obvious anyone should have thought of it. And she may have been right, Jenny thought, with a shrug.
Sure enough, when she queried LizzieAI, she affirmed that all of the MDP's were full. Jenny was so glad that the tablet would only open at her command.
"Asking permission to transmit this to The Council," said Nona, a salute implied in her crisp tone.
"Of course. They should know. What can we do to secure them? Should you take them back to headquarters?"
"I don't know, Jenny. That might be an obvious move and we don't know how far the Groga have infiltrated the network. They may actually be safer right here. This gate office has proven to be impervious to attack, so far, at least with the weapons the Groga brought to bear last time. Either way, I will let The Council know and you should send a message to Lova."
After she had done so, Jenny asked LizzieAI where she would recommend keeping the MDPs in the office.
"There is a floor vault under the desk, with the keyword, '88badWolf88'," LizzieAI told her.
Jenny never ceased to be amazed at the forethought and precautions Lizzie had taken in all she had done. Jenny hoped that this would eventually come with experience.
She stooped to peer below the desk. Sure enough, there was a tile on the floor that looked different from the others. Rather than a combination lock such as you would expect, there was a button. Jenny pressed it and a keyboard slid out with a plain grey and black display. She typed the password in and the tile slid away, revealing a small safe with a number of small items in it. She didn't take time to examine them, however. She felt an urgency to put the MDPs in a secure place. She definitely wasn't going to carry them around with her.
No sooner had the tile slid back into place, she rose to find all three of her guards standing, facing the door to her house, with their quarterstaffs in their hands, Lyra with a finger over her lips.
"There was a noise," she sent in mindspeech and pointed to the door that led into the house.
"I'm sure it's just the boys back to report," Jenny sent back.
"And if it isn't?" Lyra arched an eyebrow. Jenny shrugged.
"Stay behind us." Nona sent as they headed for the door.
They opened the door silently, and as they entered the living room it was as if time slowed. Several things happened all at once.
Three workmen stood as if frozen in a moment of time. The shock on their faces was evidence that they didn't expect to see anyone in the house. Their grey coveralls and the toolboxes in their hands told Jenny there was probably a work van parked out in her driveway. But if these had been the workmen Burt had contracted, he would have warned her they were coming, and they wouldn't be scowling at the four women as if they meant murder.
Before the moment of shock was dispelled, Tidbit was in the air, leaping with an enraged howl, claws extended, directly at the face of the workman in the front. Jenny had no idea he could leap so high. He dug his claws into the man's face and shredded his eyes, leaving bloody streams running down his face and continued to attack. The man screeched in pain and rage and tried to pull the cat off of him, but Tidbit had dug his front claws into his shirt and was now clawing his belly with his hind feet.
In the meantime, Lyra, Mynn and Nona had surrounded the two other men, their quarterstaffs whirling. From the toolbox one man had grabbed a long handled wrench and was swinging it in an attempt to ward off Nona's attack and the other had a large maul in his hand. But neither of them had the reach allowed by the quarterstaffs and their weapons were unwieldy.
Whack! Whack! Crack! Lyra and Mynn alternated rapid blows from either side of the man with the beard. The dark-bearded man with the maul had no chance to connect because he couldn't strike at one without exposing himself to the other.
Jenny saw that the first man was laying on the floor, moaning, clutching his bloody face in his hands, Tidbit standing over him and making that curious half howl, half growl she had first heard when he had attacked Cinder what now seemed like years ago. The front of the man's shirt was oozing blood. He wouldn't be a problem any time soon.
She decided she could do the best by aiding Nona. She and the grizzled fellow with the wrench were circling one another cautiously. Jenny's mind flashed back to all of those practice sessions when Arvid had insisted she retrieve her staff over and over again out of her MDP until it seemed to appear in her hands like a magic trick and how useless it had seemed at the time.
But now it flashed into her hands and the man who was circling with Nona had his back to her. Evidently, since she appeared to have no weapon, he hadn't thought of her as a threat. Her staff came down on his head with an audible "CRACK!" and the man fell like his bones had melted.
Now the last man, his maul in his hands and his face in an enraged scowl was surrounded by four angry, armed women who circled him, whacking at him from every angle. With a growl of disgust, he threw the maul down on the floor so forcefully that it cracked a tile. "I GIVE! I GIVE!" he shouted, throwing both hands into the air.
Lyra gave him a final whack in the gut, and he fell to his knees.
Nona went straight to work, handcuffing each of them roughly while Mynn pulled out her first aid kit. "We want you to be healthy when we interrogate you," she purred sweetly.
The man groaned as she cleaned his wounds. "He won't be able to see again," she said cheerily. "but we can't afford to have him die of an infection now, can we?"
The fellow Jenny had cracked on the head lay very still. "Is he dead? Did I kill him?" she asked, and she realized she was trembling.
"No," said Nona briskly. "But he's gonna have one heck of a headache when he wakes up. He's probably got a concussion, but that's for the healers to determine. Help will be coming through the gateway; you'll want to greet them."
Jenny almost collapsed with relief. In all of this time, it hadn't yet occurred to her that she might actually kill someone. The sandwiches they had eaten earlier roiled in her stomach.
Sure enough, when Jenny entered the gate office, healers and guards were streaming through the gateroom door. Jenny thanked them and led them into the living room, which now seemed excessively crowded. But not for long. The healers took in the scene quickly and started giving orders to guards who manifested stretchers from their MDPs and began to put the two injured men on them and take them directly back to the gateway without pause. The remaining man they roughly stood on his feet and frog-marched him out of the room. Two guards gathered the toolboxes, the wrench and the maul and, as they turned to leave, one said, "Well done. I assume we'll see you back at headquarters to report what just happened here?"
Lyra nodded, the man saluted and out he went.
Jenny looked around herself in shock. It had all happened so fast that, if it wasn't for the over-turned cooler, a cracked floor tile, and the small puddle of blood on the floor, she wouldn't have believed it had actually occurred.
"So much for no physical activity," she murmured to Tidbit. "You never cease to surprise me. Are you OK?"
"Groga don't taste very good," was all he said, licking the blood off of his paws.
"Let's see what our friends left us," Nova said, heading for the front door. It was too late to worry about the ruse of the rental car. The need for information trumped the need for secrecy. Jenny was relieved, however, that the street seemed to be empty at the moment.
Out in the driveway was a white panel van with "Jerry's Plumbing, since 1996" painted on the side. The intruders hadn't bothered to lock it, assuming a quick and easy getaway. They had obviously assumed Jenny was alone, with only Tidbit for protection, not counting on his ferocity. They opened the back doors. It was empty. Not a gum wrapper or a pop bottle or even any other tools or equipment. It was spotless.
Mynn sighed. "They weren't taking any chances. Maybe the forensics guys will have more luck with their toolboxes."
Before they closed the doors, they checked to see if the keys had been left in the ignition, but they hadn't, and they went back into the house, Jenny's Guards leading the way. This business of bodyguards going everywhere she went was going to take some getting used to, Jenny thought, but she didn't object. After all, they had just saved her life moments ago and this was only going to get worse. "Girl power," she said to no one in particular and all three of her guards grinned.
"OK, let's get to headquarters," Jenny said. "It's time we got some questions answered."
