~*~*~*~*~
"Hey, Jack." A high whistle, followed by a friendly pinch of beak on nose. "Up and at 'em, up and at 'em!"
Jack winced, bringing up a hand to scratch the familiar white and yellow-crested head. "Norton, how many times have I asked Ta'ra not to let you out 'till I'm up...." His gaze fixed on the ceiling, and he froze. Wooden beams?
Definitely wood. And the air sure didn't smell like L.A. Pine; a hint of frying fish. Wood smoke. But not a trace of smog. Where the hell am I?
"Hey, you're up!" A young Amerasian teenager plopped onto the edge of his bed, keeping a tight grip on the collar of a blue-tick hound. "Great! Maybe now I can talk Tet out of eating your squab." Active hands scratched behind floppy ears. "When Uncle String said I'd need to watch him, he wasn't kidding!"
"Wha-?" Jack managed, curling a protective right arm in front of his feathered friend. The left didn't seem to want to work too well; the light blue tee shirt somebody had dragged over his head didn't hide the swath of bandages curving up his arm toward his neck. And it ached, like someone had drawn a dull, hot poker from his forearm up into his shoulder.
At least he could feel his fingers. Ow.
"Don't let him out of your reach," the teen went on cheerfully, dragging Tet out of the bedroom in his wake. "Sometimes the back door doesn't latch all the way and Uncle String says the eagle'd be on him in maybe five seconds. Hey! Uncle String! Uncle Michael!"
Norton fluffed up his crest, whistled the "Twilight Zone" theme.
"You said it, buddy," Jack murmured. Sunlight through a small window, model jets on the shelves, a helicopter blueprint on the wall... where was he, the kid's bedroom? In that case, where was this kid's bedroom? "How you doin', Norton?"
"I'm good, Jack!" The cockatoo's eyes half-closed; he ground his beak gently together, familiar birdspeak for Hi, glad to see you, happy to be here. "How you doin'?"
"Pretty good, buddy. Pretty good." Considering it looked like bottom of the ninth an' two outs for a while there, Jack thought. Has Ta'ra got good timing, or what?
"You can thank Caitlin for that." His favorite Martian walked through the doorway, smiling brighter than sunlight. "She was flying; I only told her where to find you." Ta'ra's smile turned impish. "She says she hopes our next lesson's a bit quieter."
"Hey, baby!" Norton let loose with a perfect wolf-whistle.
"I was not thinking that," Jack said automatically. He lifted his left arm an inch off the colorful quilts someone had thrown over him. "Where are we? And what's with the mummy wrapping?"
Ta'ra bit her lip, scratched Norton alongside his crest. "We're in a valley in the mountains, not too far from Van Nuys. Eagle Lake. And your arm...." She hesitated.
"What?" He didn't like that flinch. Not one bit. "What about it?"
"It- that was a digestive tendril, Jack," she said reluctantly. "With the state of your medical technology...."
"What she means to say, Detective, is that you're in for a considerable period of physical recovery." A cane tapped along polished hardwood; a white-clad man leaned on it, standing in the doorway. "There's going to be a certain amount of scarring, and by the time you're through with your rehabilitative sessions, you'll likely have called the therapists every foul name in the English language. That, I guarantee you." A smile curved his mustache; with a shock, Jack realized one lens of the man's glasses was permanently dark. "But you should recover most of your use of the arm. If you're willing to work at it."
"Most." It was like a death knell.
"Most," the stranger said firmly, as a man might shake a hysterical comrade by the shoulder. "Nothing that would force you to leave the department, even if you were still in uniform. And don't tell me I don't know how you feel." He gestured towards the dark lens. "I'm a pilot."
He swept grandly out of sight; Jack let out a breath, feeling that strange intensity release him from its grip. "Whoof. Who was that masked man?"
"Michael was not wearing a mask... oh." Mischief crept into Ta'ra's expression. "Sometimes I forget you're not familiar with empaths."
"Empath? Him?"
"To a degree, yes. Though most of his sensitivity seems quite solidly aimed at his companions. You likely wouldn't have even noticed, if you weren't sensitive yourself."
"What?" Him? Not a chance. Human or Xenomorph, reading minds only came to no good. "Never mind. Dion?"
"We got her," Ta'ra said with a shudder. "We did get her. And her mate."
"Mate?" Oh, yeah. Oh, hell. Jack swallowed dryly. "Somethin' tells me you better take this from the top."
~*~*~*~*~
"And both creatures were thoroughly destroyed," Michael finished, leaning against the cabin bar. Marella sat beside him, files ready to hand; String loitered behind the bar with a cool glass of water and a cooler gaze. Caitlin and Dominic were out of hearing range, unless he listened; they'd taken Le Van out with Tet, bearing in mind that his discussion with the two officers would likely go better without too many attentive ears. "We can only hope that if Yates' impersonator had to resort to such extreme measures to find a mate, that such creatures are highly rare." He shrugged. "I've told Lieutenant Maldonado he can cancel the APB. Now that we're certain both the werewolf's toxin and our treatment have cleared your system, we should be able to bring you back to civilization within a few days."
Ensconced on String's couch with his bird, Jack groaned. "Aw, c'mon, Vic. Not another APB...."
Archangel took that in with an arched brow. "Ah, yes. You have been the subject of more than one, haven't you?"
Detective Breslin opened his mouth, evidently thought better of whatever he'd planned to say. "Long story. I know how she got mixed up in this," he jerked a thumb toward Marella, gave her a respectful nod. "Nice ditz act. Would've snowed half of headquarters."
"Why, thank you," Marella inclined her head.
"But how did you?" Jack drove on.
Archangel gave him a minuscule shrug. "William Yates used to work for my agency."
"Agency-" The detective stared at the snowy white of suit and dress. "You dress like that and you're spooks?"
"Distracting, isn't it?" Michael stifled a grin.
"Which would suggest that odd black helicopter is somehow involved with you," Ta'ra mused.
"What helicopter?" Three voices chorused. Marella's face was perfectly straight, but Michael caught a hint of sparkle in dark eyes.
"That, would be a yes," Jack observed dryly, glancing at Ta'ra. "Sort of."
Archangel lifted a skeptical brow. "And I suppose your partner isn't an illegal alien, Detective?" The blue gaze switched to Ta'ra. "Ms. Andulon. Presuming that is, indeed, your real name. The background Breslin and Lieutenant Maldonado created for you is quite good, but it won't hold up to a determined investigation. It certainly didn't hold up to ours."
"Hey, wait a minute-"
"It's all right, Jack." She regarded the spy almost as coolly. "What is it you want?"
"Mostly, to warn you." Archangel's fingers flexed on the head of his cane. "I happen to be something of an expert on the more... esoteric technology available to the United States. Yours is noticeably beyond the cutting edge." He cast her a wry glance. "Be careful."
"Mostly?" Jack eyed his paling partner, turned a glare on the spy. "What else?"
"The Hivemind invasion shook every administration on this planet," Michael said bluntly. "If a foreign government - or, much as I hate to admit it, some factions of our own government - learned a source of highly advanced technology was available, they'd stop at nothing to obtain it." Pain creased his visible eye. "Anyone can be broken, Ta'ra. Anyone."
Ta'ra nodded slowly, shivering. "I know."
"So I'm going to ask you something I have no right to," Archangel said softly. "Stay here. In L.A. Where I can cloak your background more thoroughly, and where my people can watch out for you." A wry smile crossed his face. "Most of them won't know what they are guarding... but they'll know you are important. Which itself will put you at risk." He met her gaze squarely. "I ask for the most precious thing you have: your trust."
"And how do we know you're not one of the guys who'd be trying to squeeze something out of her?" the detective demanded.
"I can't deny I'd enjoy having access to the technological principles," Archangel admitted. "But I have a luxury not usually granted politicians, Detective Breslin. I have time." He set down his glass. "Or at least... as much time as the Hivemind will allow us."
"They will be back," Ta'ra acknowledged. "Last I knew, they avoided this sector of space; we patrol it, if irregularly, and while our fleets are smaller, we can match them weapon for weapon. They've no taste for an even fight. But now they know this planet harbors sentient life they can transform into their own kind... and you've no concerted psychic defense to hold them off."
An alien, Michael thought. I'm speaking with an actual alien. Well, add that to the list of federal laws he'd broken recently.
"So are you here as a cultural observer, or...?" Marella arched a questioning brow.
"It was - an accident," the analyst admitted.
"Alien monster. Prison ship. Things go boom," Jack said shortly. "And she landed in my crime scenes."
Ta'ra nodded. "The long-range transmitter on the Andulon was destroyed, even before we crashed it into your Pacific Ocean. And while you may not have many active psychics, this planet's overall psychokinetic field is quite strong. In essence, they've no way to find me through the static. Or even know I'm alive."
"Can you build a transmitter?"
Michael watched their start with a hidden smile. Amazing, how people could forget Hawke was in the room. It was his stillness, more than anything; quiet silence, ready to act in an instant.
"We've been trying," Ta'ra admitted.
"But she's a med-tech officer, and I'm a detective," Jack added. "It's not like we can get spare parts at Radio Shack." Suspicion rang through his tone. "Why?"
"Our peoples have a common enemy." Rising to leave, Michael spread an empty hand. "I'm not asking you to speak for your race, Ta'ra. But given the circumstances, they might want to speak to us. And I'm fairly certain you'd like to speak to them. If our technology's up to it." An impish smile creased his face as he paused by the back door. "As I said, I am rather knowledgeable in esoteric technology."
"Think they'll go for it, sir?" Marella asked under her breath as String made sure the latch caught before following them down the path to the lake.
"I have no idea," Archangel said frankly. "Ask me what a Russian would do. Ask me about a Slav. We're dealing with a completely alien culture." He squinted into the lake-glitter. "I hope so."
~*~*~*~*~
"Think we can trust them?"
"To a degree," Ta'ra allowed, considering the tall, flamboyant man who'd stalked out the door. And his quiet, subtler companion; for Hawke was Archangel's, certain as they were both their Lady's. "They are quite serious, Jack. In the wrong hands, I could be a source of great danger to your people."
Jack hmphed, shifting on the couch. "Hate to say it, Ta'ra, but we were killing each other a heck of a long time before you ever brought pulse rifles on the scene. Something about being human." He squirmed again, shifting Norton off his bandaged arm. The cockatoo clucked and muttered, nibbling at the hand that scratched under his feathers. "Unless you've found a way to get around that."
"No," she admitted softly. "No, we haven't. We're more peaceful than many of your nations, so far as I can determine... but we still kill." The ability to thought-process might allow them to understand another's viewpoint, but that didn't mean they'd agree with it.
And even with all their safeguards, the mind was such a complex creation. Psychopaths did crop up among her people. Not so many as the two or three percent some American scientists estimated among Earthlings... but still, more than enough.
She'd known precisely why Jack feared Eddie Fiori, long before the murderer had taken his first shots at them. She'd fully agreed with Vic's order for the frightened cop to vacate the area while the LAPD carried out their search. There was a limit to how much you could predict the actions of one with no morals to leash their actions, and the lieutenant had no wish to dangle Jack as live bait.
They'd ended up doing almost exactly that, but that had been her fault. If she hadn't left a blaster unsecured....
"Hey." Jack's voice was soft, as he shifted a comforting hand to her shoulder. "We got him, right? We got him."
But I didn't say anything about Eddie.
"What do you mean you didn't - oh, no. Oh, no." The detective shook his head, alarm rolling off him like water. "Ta'ra, I can't-"
She snared his hand before he could pull away. Jack. It's all right. "There wasn't time to try and duplicate some of my own medications. We had to use what was locally available. It was far less specific than I would have liked, but it should wear off. You're simply going to be more sensitive than usual for a while." She nodded toward the expanse of empty forest out the window. "Which is why we're in, how do you say it here, the middle of nowhere?" A tentative smile curved her lips. Just hold me. Please? We came so close to losing you.
Jack shivered. "Feels warm," he got out, inching nearer. "Different."
Ta'ra leaned her head on his shoulder, basking in the comfort of a familiar mind. Slid her palm along his as she would one of her own people; as she had the first time they'd embraced, trying to forget the horrors they'd seen, the loss of her people and his partner. Flexing hand against hand, touching fingertip to fingertip-
Stopped, eyes wide, as familiar fingers shifted against her own. There was an echo of her touch, a clumsy effort to match emotion with her own....
Suspicious spots of red rose on her partner's cheekbones. "I should stop, huh?"
"No." Don't you dare. She drew him back to her with a kiss, reveling in the layer of touch on touch and emotion on emotion. Clumsy, perhaps; but surely no worse than her first kiss, decades ago. Some things just needed practice.
And it was bright, and welcome, and this-is-my-friend....
"Whoa." Jack drew in a deep breath as they ended the touch. "Now I know the guys'll be waiting on the beach for this invasion."
Chuckling, she bounced a throw-pillow off his nose. "You are incorrigible."
Jack affected a wounded look. "Who, me? I just-"
A furry whisper of curiosity. Something... skirting the edges of thought, like a bat's high call to locate obstacles.
"What was that?"
"I'm not certain." Ta'ra reached back toward that feather-light brush of another's thoughts. Who are you?
Classified.
No hostile intent.
Considering alliance Michael Archangel/Hawke/Santini Air?
Jack was peering out the windows, as if he could see through trees to wherever that wary touch was lurking. "Don't tell me that's human."
"No," Ta'ra said softly, feeling the lightning-flicker of alien thoughts. "Not even one of my species."
But young. And somehow... innocent. Lady?
Yes.
"That's tied up with a guy like Briggs?" Jack shook his head, amazed. "How?"
A feathery giggle. Classified.
Jack raised a dark brow. "Anything about you that isn't classified?"
Another giggle. No.
"Terrific."
Ta'ra frowned, thinking. "I don't suppose, if we did ally with your companions, they'd be willing to tell us who you are."
Indecision. Don't know.
Possible.
Michael Archangel unlikely to provide information on "Lady" if asked now.
Willing to wait?
Ta'ra glanced at her partner. Stars, she wanted to talk to her people. Wanted it so badly. "This is your planet, Jack." You know its dangers better than I.
"Comes to guys like him, I don't know that much more." Jack finger-combed back dark hair. "But if it comes down to it... least the guy's up-front about what he wants. And what other people might do for what they want." He glanced toward the lake. "Don't suppose you'd clue us in before the ax came down?"
Michael Archangel would warn of danger if at all possible.
Willing to extract from enemy hands, arrange alternate identities if necessary.
Hawke willing to do so even if alliance refused.
You are not the enemy.
"Thank goodness for small favors," Jack muttered, ruffling white feathers. Norton whistled, rubbed his head against Jack's neck. "Ta'ra, is she-?"
"Quite dangerous. Yes." That she could sense clearly, in the casual way Lady had classified them as not-enemy, with an echoed image of the werewolves counter-pointing just what enemy was.
Yet innocent. Like one of her own race's children. Like the young girl they'd rescued almost a year ago; frightened, telekinetic Tori....
Jack's hand touched her shoulder. "You think she's some kind of - secret government project?"
Ta'ra shrugged. "I can't think of what else she could be. Which implies your government is working with psychic abilities...." The implications hit like a hammer. "And we might be able to help after all."
"Ah... you lost me."
"It's part of our history. Ancient history, for us, but still - Jack, we know what happened when our people first began to thought-process. The trials, the cultural upheavals, the new laws we had to write into our legal system." Sitting still wasn't enough anymore; she jumped from the couch, paced the wooden floor. "Our government might not want to give you access to our technology - and no offense, Jack, but for the most part I'd have to agree with them-"
"But they're not going to want eight billion more Hivemind in their backyard, either," the detective finished her thought, leaning forward. "So... what? You think they'd send in advisors? Psychic special forces?"
"I don't know what they'd do," Ta'ra said honestly. "But whatever Lady is, she's not like anything I've ever heard of on my planet. Somehow you've created something my people don't have. Something that might help us." An old, old knot of tension loosened, even as her mouth went suddenly dry. For as long as she'd known, her people had lived with the threat of Hivemind attacks. If they could find an ally, a true ally.... "We have a reason to make contact, Jack."
"What, you wanting to phone home isn't enough?" But the shadows in blue eyes told her he knew the answer to that. "So, you want to tell the guy in the white suit now, or let him squirm a few days?"
"He probably already knows."
"How the hell-" Jack swore, gaze flicking around the room. "He bugged the place?"
"He didn't have to," Ta'ra answered blithely. "Some of your people really aren't like mine, Jack. Michael's people can hear quite farther than normal." She frowned, thinking. "Though that amount of physical difference from your species' norms seems unlikely... I wonder if it's a form of clairvoyance?"
"You mean - they were listening the whole-" Jack turned red.
Ta'ra chuckled softly. "They are covert operatives, Jack. I'm certain they've heard worse."
"Like that's supposed to make me feel better?" Jack flung up his hand, missing Norton's inquisitive beak by inches. "Any other bombshells you want to drop about these guys?"
She smiled. "I think they thought about hiring you."
"Great." Jack rubbed his head, stabbed a finger at air. "Thanks, but no thanks. Transmitter first. Then you scare 'em with your medical tests. I like my job." He glanced at the lake. "Speaking of...."
"From what I could pick up from Marella, Archangel intends to arrange for Franz Wilhelm to be charged with the murders in Germany, and Dion with those here in America," Ta'ra said soberly. "Including Wilhelm's."
Jack grimaced; thought about it, shook his head grudgingly. "Dion must've been a real person," he pointed out. "Yates was. Before that thing took his place."
"Yes. They've traced her. But Dion's relations are dead. There are... less people to be hurt."
"Guess that's the best we can do," the detective admitted. "Least until the government gets off its ass and lets people know the aliens are out there. I just..." He lifted his shoulders, winced. "I'm a cop, Ta'ra. I'm supposed to catch guys who break the law. Not be one."
Ta'ra wet her lips, chose her words carefully. She'd seen this coming not long after she'd realized she was stranded on this planet. In all honesty, she'd seen it the moment she asked for his help; the dichotomy that had to come between the law he served and the people he'd sworn to protect. A choice she'd forced on him, because she had no other choice, because there was no other way to ensure the Xenomorph would not engulf this planet in a wave of blood and death....
"It's not your fault, Ta'ra." A quiet, tired smile. "I knew what I was doing when I let you out of those cuffs."
"It is my fault," she contradicted. "At least in part. But Lieutenant Maldonado has always understood that your goal is to protect, rather than prosecute. And he believes in you." She glanced at him awry. "Though Michael said something about being glad you weren't - a Detective Ellison?"
"How'd a spook run into Cascade's Cop of the Year... never mind, I don't want to know." Jack whistled, drawing an echo from Norton. "Man, that must've hurt. Word on the grapevine is, Ellison's stiffer than a-" he cut himself off.
"Corpse left on ice ten days?" Ta'ra finished the thought, amused. Police officers had such interesting turns of phrase.
"I was not... well, maybe I was thinking that...."
She laughed, held him close. Moved her head aside as Norton nibbled her hair. Another night of death and fire; another brief calm before weeks upon weeks of nightmares, flinches, tears in the night.
But they were alive. Alive.
"We got them, Jack," she whispered, leaning into the warmth of that familiar mind. "We did get them."
~*~*~*~*~
Translations from German:
Unheimlich - weird, unearthly.
Verdamment! - Damn it.
A/N: Monsters of Hollywood films bear little resemblance to their folkloric origins. Legendary werewolves do not pass lycanthropy to their victims by biting; in fact, some European court records of "werewolves" (who, based on the accounts we have, were probably psychopathic serial killers) mention victims devoured "as if by a wolf", and only bring up the charge of shape-changing as an afterthought. Likewise, folkloric vampires are often not affected by sunlight. Some in central Europe were thought to live an amphibious existence, sleeping in a pool of blood inside their grave.
Something is Out There originally aired in the summer of 1988.
An inner-city detective's investigation of a series of hideous murders uncovers a pair of intergalactic survivors; the last med-tech from the prison ship Andulon, and the shape-changing Xenomorph who escaped her, who's attempting to clone itself to take over the planet.
In each murder, the victim seems to have been hit by an exploratory operation done within split seconds. At every scene, the cop (Jack Breslin, played by Joe Cortese) sees the same young woman (Ta'ra - Maryam d'Abo). Jack pursues, discovering (the hard way) she has inhuman agility and carries a weapon that emits a beam of raw energy. She escapes, but he finds a piece of equipment she dropped. When she searches his apartment he catches her. She talks him into taking her to her shuttlecraft in the desert and explains she was a med-tech officer on a prison ship carrying a dangerous creature, a Xenomorph - a murderous alien shape-changer. Despite her society's best precautions, it took control of a prison warder and the other prisoners' minds. After killing most of the ship's occupants, it escaped to Earth in a shuttlecraft.
Joining forces, they track the Xenomorph. After close shaves Ta'ra deduces it hasn't found the technology it needs on Earth and has returned to the Andulon. She and Jack follow, after having let Jack's boss, Lieutenant Victor Maldonado, in on her secret. Eventually they corner the Xenomorph while it's taking over the dead bodies of the other prisoners. In the end, they try to destroy it by crashing the ship into one of Earth's oceans.
Escaping from the resulting explosion in the Xenomorph's prison cell, they believe the creature destroyed. Ta'ra is now stranded on Earth; Jack offers to help her find her feet.
Something Is Out There started as a 4-hour TV mini-series. (Released as a twin cassette video movie in Australia.) It was successful enough to be followed by a full TV series; unfortunately, though the characters were believable and the cast excellent, the series was up against Beauty and the Beast and cancelled after only six weeks. (Though eight episodes were made. The last two were shown in the U.K., Australia, and New Zealand, but not in the U.S. Anyone have copies?) Like the X-Files, the series dealt with aliens, the paranormal, and government cover-ups, and teamed a strong scientific female character with an offbeat male cop. Though Jack was a lot more practical than Mulder... and a lot less likely to leave his partner out of the loop when trouble was heading their way.
Stranded on Earth, Ta'ra moved in with Jack, posing as his cousin. Cleared by Vic of various charges (the Xenomorph racked up one heck of a body count; as Vic put it, "I got enough dead scientists to put a dent in the test tube market!"), Jack returned to work. Also thanks to Vic, he kept getting the department's weirdest cases, which, with Ta'ra's help, he usually solved. (Though not without lots of comic cultural misunderstandings between Ta'ra, Jack, and anyone else in range. Try explaining the Grand Canyon to an alien. A "big hole in the ground". Oh yeah.)
And Ta'ra's mashed potatoes did set fire to Jack's wall.