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  "Understood." He looked a bit pale at the idea.

  McKenna nibbled on a chip as she tried to organize her thoughts. With reluctance she went into the last part of the story, covering the trip to Bogota, the political games, and then the flight home.

  "Gods, this last part is going to take whiskey." She felt the agreement from the others and JD rose.

  "You know what? I think you're right. Tell you what, let me get some adult drinks, and you guys can ask all the questions I can see on your faces, then we'll get to the last part."

  ~I'm in no hurry to get to this part either. Besides, I want another burger.~

  People stood and stretched, and she saw Perc and his parents deep in conversation, while Helena had a death grip on her sister and Oswald stayed close to them, though the kids headed out to play for a bit in human form, kicking a soccer ball around. Jessi and Jamie seemed to have gained another inch or two in the last week, so they balanced out the seven- and ten-year-old kids of Helena. All of them kept glancing back, checking in on the adults, and she completely understood the wariness.

  Hunger whispered at the back of her mind, and she went and made herself another hamburger even as Kirk, followed by Guinness and Laredo, approached.

  "I really, really want to say your experience has created a mental break and make you go see a doctor," Kirk started the conversation as he sipped at a beer, looking out at the mountains.

  "So why don't you?" she asked as she finished doctoring the burger to her tastes. Even stuff she liked didn't taste as good as it once had. But it still tasted good, JD made awesome burgers.

  "Because out of all your flaws," he snorted as she shot him a sharp look with a wordless protest, "you're outspoken, don't deal with idiots well, have no patience with politics, and occasionally can't see the forest for the trees. Yes, you have flaws. But lying isn't one of them. Or stretching the truth. And this truth seems so unbelievable the only option is to believe. Besides, even if you had starved the entire time you were gone you wouldn't have dropped the sheer amount of weight you've lost. All of you. So yes. Though I really don't want to, I believe you."

  "It's going to get worse." McKenna said softly and shoved another bite in her mouth so she didn't say anything else.

  "Yeah. I get that feeling." He turned and looked directly at her for the first time. "You've got my support. Regardless. So might as well rip off the bandage and tell us."

  Guinness flashed her a smile as Laredo tipped an imaginary hat. "I bet you'll never be boring." Laredo's voice teasing her a bit.

  ~Yes, but will I still be a cop when this is all done? Hell, will we even be alive?~

  She forced a smile and finished her burger, then grabbed two cookies and took a seat watching the interplay of relationships around her.

  JD had brought out two bottles of whiskey and most of the adults had some. Connie refused, wrinkling her nose even as her husband laughed at her a bit. The two worked well together, their love steady and strong. McKenna suspected she'd really like them if she got the chance to know them.

  Moving her attention to Cass's family, Helena was the tornado and her husband the steady wall she leaned against, and their love for Cass shone as bright as Cass's love for them.

  Carina had moved out to play with the kids, and Toni watched everyone with stress at the corners of her eyes and mouth. But she had reason.

  Everyone had settled back down, and she felt the weight of their eyes on her as she twisted the tumbler in her hand over and over.

  "Well? What's the big secret?" Anne was the one to ask, but when McKenna looked up everyone had their eyes on her. Toni nodded then moved her attention to the kids, the line of shoulders reflected her tension.

  "Everyone remember a news story lately about a signal from space that SETI Institute is offering a prize if anyone can decipher it? Most people are betting it's reflected and distorted TV or radio shows."

  Most of them nodded, though she noted Guinness just shrugged. His idea of news centered around sports, rugby to be specific. Connie and Dan glanced at each other shaking their heads.

  "SETI is the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence. They normally are involved in scanning the skies for something that means there are others out there." McKenna knew it wasn't exactly accurate, but close enough for now. The confusion disappeared from their faces and she continued. "It isn't. It's a signal from an Elentrin ship headed towards Earth. Per Wefor, they should be here in the next thirty days."

  Chapter 2 – The Other Shoe

  There has been no official statement about the situation involving the kidnapping of McKenna Largo and her associates. While there is no scheduled press conference, rumors of an intense investigation abound. At least one person has been fired from the Embassy in Bogota though it is unclear if that person had anything to do with the kidnapping. Investigators here are still looking to see how five people were put on a plane and flown to South America with no one being aware. The Sacramento International Airport is on high alert as all flight plans are being reviewed. ~ KWAK News

  McKenna didn't know what she had expected. Outrage, surprise, disbelief, anger? Instead, they looked at her and there was a soft sigh that seemed to emerge, from all of them at once, and shoulders slumped.

  "I was afraid that was what you were going to say," Dan murmured.

  Kirk nodded his head. "Yeah."

  She suspected she looked like an idiot right now, glancing around at them. "You did?" The other shifters looked just as surprised, even Toni stared at them in shock.

  "Sure." Kirk lifted his hand half way, though he glanced at Anne with a half-smirk. She just rubbed her forehead with her middle finger at him. "Once you mentioned alien nanobots and that you had the commander version, it only made sense for there to be aliens. Why would they send an infection here unless they planned on coming to Earth? Do we, well, you, know why they wanted to have shifters here on Earth? What are their plans?"

  McKenna felt like an anvil had been lifted off her chest and for a minute she thought she might pass out, the sense of relief made her dizzy.

  "I was absolutely sure you'd never believe us. I mean aliens, AIs, telepathy, all of it." She knew her voice had a bit of a sharp tone to it. Maybe it was fear and relief. She didn't know as she took a deep drink of the whiskey.

  Laredo snorted. "McKenna, you are the most blunt, honest, and straightforward person I know. And you turn into a cougar. At this point if you told me God spoke to you, I'd probably give you the benefit of the doubt. But overall, aliens actually make way more sense than just about any other theory that's been given serious consideration."

  Everyone nodded their agreement. McKenna had to rub her face to prevent incipient tears. Exhaustion batted at her, and she suspected when they slept it would probably be for a long while.

  "Okay. Here's what Wefor told us. Be aware, Wefor is a program that a solar flare badly damaged. What she rebuilt is not what the Elentrin thought it should be. I think even she will admit her advice must be taken with a grain of salt."

  [Correct. All information provided is accurate according to the data available. But if there is a flaw in the programming, the information could be incorrect.]

  McKenna repeated what Wefor said for the non-shifters.

  "She?" asked Connie, tilting her head.

  "Eh, I don't really think Wefor has a gender. Nor are we sure how independent she is versus a very advanced program. But she lives in my head, and doesn't feel like a male, and calling something that we gave a name, 'it' seems more wrong."

  A few nods and murmurs, but then Kirk redirected. "So what information has Wefor imparted?"

  She refilled her glass, tried to organize her thoughts as she sipped.

  "Shifters are called Kaylid. They, well, the Elentrin, created them as cannon fodder. They use us against their enemy, the Drakyn. They seed a planet, give us time to cause issues and come 'rescue' the population from us."

  "Rescue? Why would we want to be rescued from you?" Helena ask
ed this with her arm tight around Cass as her eyes didn't leave McKenna.

  "So as Wefor explained it, the nanobots were supposed to lock us into the animal form, but with our minds gone. Instead there would be insane animals in our sizes attacking and killing, unable to be controlled. They expected mass causalities, fear, and for us to be ready to accept any help. They come in and ‘cure' the madness. Then in gratitude we let some of our people go with them to ‘help' them in return for them helping us." She threw her hands up and sagged backwards. "Not sure I understand the logic, but it's happened multiple times."

  "They don't know how many people are on Earth," Charley said then shrank back as everyone turned to look at him.

  "What do you mean?" McKenna asked, eyes narrowed.

  Charley started to shrink a bit more then shook it off and straightened up. "We've been having dreams, Jessi, Jamie, and me." Toni sucked in a breath and glanced at her kids, but they just nodded somberly at her.

  "They said the population of Earth was," he paused, thinking, "nine hundred million?"

  "Nine hundred seventy," Jessi provided. "And they're expecting like a million Kaylid."

  Everyone blinked, and Perc frowned. "One of my dreams I looked out the window, a planet hung in the view. It was blue and oddly familiar."

  "We saw Saturn," Charley said, his voice quiet. "I checked after, it had the rings around the planet."

  A hush fell over the group, and McKenna closed her eyes thinking over the information. "Why would they be so off on the population level?" Her voice sounded a bit shaky to her own ears, she swallowed hard trying to get more in control.

  "Have they ever visited Earth before?" Daniel asked, and her eyes snapped open, and she looked at him.

  [Unknown.]

  "Wefor doesn't know."

  "I think so," Charley said, chewing his lip, brows furrowed.

  "Why?" Toni asked before McKenna could. Her voice sharp, and McKenna realized her hands were white-knuckled around her glass.

  ~JD,~ she whispered on a private channel. ~Look at Toni. Can you help?~

  "They gave us languages to learn, and I think I know them. I think Jessi and I do. Jamie, did you have the same dream when you were separated from us?"

  Jamie nodded a bit. "I was in a hospital room, but different than the room I was really in for my broken arm. They said they were uploading a language module. It felt weird, but I didn't really think about it after I woke. I still felt funny from the drugs for my arm." He held up the bright blue cast, and McKenna saw Toni tense even more.

  ~Yeah, moving now.~ JD rose from his chair, moved it over to the space between Toni and the door and set down next to her. In a smooth move he grabbed her legs, put them on her lap, removed her shoes and started to massage her feet.

  McKenna saw a fast look between Cass and JD, then Cass nodded and moved her attention back to Helena who all but had a death grip on her arm. Toni started then relaxed as JD rubbed her feet.

  ~Interesting choice.~ McKenna said, her smile only visible in the mental voice.

  ~She needed to be touched, and I can't exactly cuddle in mixed company. This people will overlook.~ JD's voice was calm, matter of fact, and McKenna nodded.

  ~True, wish I had realized that sooner. Thanks.~

  She flipped her attention back to Charley. "What languages did you learn?"

  "English, which we knew, but Spanish, Mandarin, umm, Arabic and French."

  All the adults had their eyes fixed on the three kids, and they shrank backwards, Jessi snarling softly in reaction.

  "So can you speak it?" Toni asked, her voice flat, even as JD kneaded on her feet.

  "Maybe? I mean not like we've had any time to play with it, and I don't know anyone that speaks Mandarin," Charley protested.

  "Vous aimez être capable de jouer comme un loup?" JD said slowly.

  ~You speak French?~ Rang out through the mindscape.

  ~Bad high school French. Give me a break.~

  Charley blinked then responded with unaccented French, but smoothly, fluid compared to how JD had been halting. "Oui. C'est amusant et j'ai can' t imaginer être autre chose que ce que je suis."

  Everyone looked at them blankly even as both males had a surprised look on their faces.

  "What did he ask you?" McKenna said even as the ramifications made her sick.

  "If I enjoyed playing as a wolf. I told him yes, and that I couldn't imagine being anything else." Charley rubbed his neck focusing on his feet. "That was odd."

  Jessi wrinkled her nose. "It felt like my brain altering my mouth so I knew what words to say, even if I didn't say anything." She grinned, flashed a look to both boys who met her smile with identical ones.

  "I don't think so," Toni said with narrowed eyes. "If you think you're going to cuss in another language so I won't know, think again."

  The crestfallen look on the twins' faces had most of the adults hiding snickers and all the kids pretending that wasn't what they were thinking.

  "I'd say they're coming, but we're back to when did they visit before, and why are the numbers off so badly?" Kirk murmured. He'd been frowning during the entire interlude.

  Just what does he think about all this? We could use his support.

  "You sound like you have an idea," JD said, even as his fingers worked on having Toni relax a bit. Though McKenna suspected being able to catch her kids being kids had helped, too.

  "Hmm," Kirk glanced over at Laredo. "You've got a history degree. Didn't most of the werewolf stories appear in the dark ages?"

  Laredo thought even as McKenna blinked.

  ~History degree?~

  ~Apparently~ replied JD.

  "That would be about right. Black plague and mad wolves appeared about then. But that's only European history. I don't know what would have correlated with the Kitsune, Jaguar or other humanoid animals in other cultures. But -" and he waved his finger in the air, "but - if you're correct and that's when they last visited, given the plague and the technology levels, that might be about where they would expect us to be at, population-wise. I can't pull up the study in my mind, but there was an estimate of what our population and technology level should have been assuming a steady growth over the seven, eight hundred years. But in the last hundred our technology growth has been exponential, not linear or even cubic. Given that, they might be expecting us at the industrial revolution stage, not at where we are."

  It took McKenna a moment to follow what he meant. "Wait, you think they're expecting gun powder and cotton mills?" Those were really the only things that stood out to her from her history class about the industrial revolution.

  "Essentially," Laredo drawled. "But that's assuming Charley remembered correctly, that the information is actually from these aliens, that it's real and from this invasion fleet, not one that came here in the Middle Ages."

  Charley, who had started to bristle, sagged a bit as Laredo continued to talk, and all of them nodded.

  "So we really don't know anything, is what you're saying."

  "Nope," agreed Kirk. "But it implies a lot, though I don't know that any of us have any ability to change anything." He sighed and looked at them. "As much as I hate to say it, I don't have any advice, and this is going to sound horribly cliché, but it seems like this problem has been dropped in your laps. Are there any other commander modules around?"

  [In theory, yes. The calculations have been refined and there should be at least five others. But there is no way to tell if all those modules survived, much less what level of damage they were subjected to.]

  McKenna relayed the words even as she wanted to cry.

  Daniel looked around the surrounding people and put his hand on his son's shoulder and squeezed, but his eyes were on McKenna. "I don't have any answers and I don't really have any contacts. But we're here and we'll support you all we can. Is there anything we can do? Should we start prepping or buying weapons?" He moved in his seat a bit as he talked, obviously uncomfortable.

  "I have no idea. I
don't know enough about what weapons they have to answer that. So only if you want?" McKenna shook her head, feeling a bit silly.

  Connie gave her a warm smile and stood. "I think we've had enough for today. McKenna, I'd like to leave you our contact information. I don't know if we can help, but if we can, ask. You helped save our son, and it looks like you're going to help save our world. Anything you need is yours."

  McKenna felt heat climb her face as the sentiment was echoed from multiple throats. In less time than she would have thought possible, they had the place cleaned up, food put away, contact information exchanged, and everyone was gone.

  Toni had hugged them all with bone-crushing fierceness, while Perc and Cass gave all of them searching looks as they left. Feeling each of them drop from her awareness hurt with an almost physical pain.

  JD looked at her, his face as drawn as hers. "Mind if I crash here? I haven't even started to deal with my house."

  "I am really, really, really, sorry," Charley said, a total hangdog look on his face.

  "We still need that story, and maybe you can explain exactly WHY my house is minus a kitchen. But not today." JD pulled Charley in to a rough hug that the boy leaned into even as he watched McKenna.

  "I don't know about you two, but I'm exhausted." She glanced around the place, but her guests had been quick and efficient and it didn't need anything else done tonight. "JD, crash wherever. Night, you two." She turned and started to head towards her room.

  "McKenna?" Charley said, and she paused turning to look at him. His voice had been small, hesitant.

  "Yeah?" She watched him, worried, but so tired that it had become hard to think.