Camp Alien Read online

  Rave reviews for the Alien novels:

  “From alternate realities to alternate galaxies, Koch takes us on the wildest adventures. But it is the camaraderie between the characters that keeps the over-the-top tale grounded and compelling.”

  —RT Book Reviews (top pick)

  “Koch still pulls the neat trick of quietly weaving in plot threads that go unrecognized until they start tying together—or snapping. This is a hyperspeed-paced addition to a series that shows no signs of slowing down.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “Aliens, danger, and romance make this a fast-paced, wittily written sf romantic comedy.”

  —Library Journal

  “Gini Koch’s Kitty Katt series is a great example of the lighter side of science fiction. Told with clever wit and non-stop pacing . . . it blends diplomacy, action and sense of humor into a memorable reading experience.”

  —Kirkus

  “The action is nonstop, the snark flies fast and furious. . . . Another fantastic addition to an imaginative series!”

  —Night Owl Sci-Fi (top pick)

  “Ms. Koch has carved a unique niche for herself in the sci-fi-romance category with this series. My only hope is that it lasts for a very long time.”

  —Fresh Fiction

  “This delightful romp has many interesting twists and turns as it glances at racism, politics, and religion en route . . . will have fanciers of cinematic sf parodies referencing Men in Black, Ghost Busters, and X-Men.”

  —Booklist (starred review)

  “I am a huge fan of Gini Koch, and this series. I adore the world building. I love the sarcasm, banter, romance, mystery, action, and a slew of superhero-like characters that stand up against evil wherever they go.”

  —Gizmo’s Reviews

  DAW Books Presents GINI KOCH’s Alien Novels:

  TOUCHED BY AN ALIEN

  ALIEN TANGO

  ALIEN IN THE FAMILY

  ALIEN PROLIFERATION

  ALIEN DIPLOMACY

  ALIEN VS. ALIEN

  ALIEN IN THE HOUSE

  ALIEN RESEARCH

  ALIEN COLLECTIVE

  UNIVERSAL ALIEN

  ALIEN SEPARATION

  ALIEN IN CHIEF

  CAMP ALIEN

  ALIEN NATION

  (coming soon from DAW)

  Copyright © 2016 by Jeanne Cook.

  All Rights Reserved.

  Cover art by Daniel Dos Santos.

  Cover design by G-Force Design.

  DAW Book Collectors No. 1724.

  Published by DAW Books, Inc.

  375 Hudson Street, New York, NY 10014.

  All characters and events in this book are fictitious.

  Any resemblance to persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.

  The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal, and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage the electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

  Nearly all the designs and trade names in this book are registered trademarks. All that are still in commercial use are protected by United States and international trademark law.

  eBook ISBN 9780698161726

  DAW TRADEMARK REGISTERED

  U.S. PAT. AND TM. OFF. AND FOREIGN COUNTRIES

  —MARCA REGISTRADA

  HECHO EN U.S.A.

  Version_1

  To my editor, Sheila Gilbert, who knows how to get the best out of everyone, me especially, and who has never said “oh, that’s a bad idea” to any of the crazy ideas I’ve tossed at her over the years.

  Contents

  Praise for the Alien novels

  Also by Gini Koch

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Acknowledgments

  Prologue

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  CHAPTER 20

  CHAPTER 21

  CHAPTER 22

  CHAPTER 23

  CHAPTER 24

  CHAPTER 25

  CHAPTER 26

  CHAPTER 27

  CHAPTER 28

  CHAPTER 29

  CHAPTER 30

  CHAPTER 31

  CHAPTER 32

  CHAPTER 33

  CHAPTER 34

  CHAPTER 35

  CHAPTER 36

  CHAPTER 37

  CHAPTER 38

  CHAPTER 39

  CHAPTER 40

  CHAPTER 41

  CHAPTER 42

  CHAPTER 43

  CHAPTER 44

  CHAPTER 45

  CHAPTER 46

  CHAPTER 47

  CHAPTER 48

  CHAPTER 49

  CHAPTER 50

  CHAPTER 51

  CHAPTER 52

  CHAPTER 53

  CHAPTER 54

  CHAPTER 55

  CHAPTER 56

  CHAPTER 57

  CHAPTER 58

  CHAPTER 59

  CHAPTER 60

  CHAPTER 61

  CHAPTER 62

  CHAPTER 63

  CHAPTER 64

  CHAPTER 65

  CHAPTER 66

  CHAPTER 67

  CHAPTER 68

  CHAPTER 69

  CHAPTER 70

  CHAPTER 71

  CHAPTER 72

  CHAPTER 73

  CHAPTER 74

  CHAPTER 75

  CHAPTER 76

  CHAPTER 77

  CHAPTER 78

  CHAPTER 79

  CHAPTER 80

  CHAPTER 81

  CHAPTER 82

  CHAPTER 83

  CHAPTER 84

  CHAPTER 85

  CHAPTER 86

  CHAPTER 87

  CHAPTER 88

  CHAPTER 89

  CHAPTER 90

  CHAPTER 91

  CHAPTER 92

  CHAPTER 93

  CHAPTER 94

  CHAPTER 95

  CHAPTER 96

  CHAPTER 97

  CHAPTER 98

  CHAPTER 99

  CHAPTER 100

  Special Excerpt from ALIEN NATION

  About the Author

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  As always, so many to thank and so little page space. But, as you can see by the size of this particular book, I’m going to go for it anyway.

  Thanks again for both the patience of Job and amazing editorial direction to the fantastic Sheila Gilbert. Bows and cries of “I am not worthy” to my awesome agent, Cherry Weiner, my amazing crit partner, Lisa Dovichi, and the best and fastest beta reader in the West, Mary Fiore. As always, wouldn’t have made it through this book with any shreds of sanity left without you four ladies and I love all of you for pu
tting up with me in all the various ways you put up with me.

  Love and thanks as always to all the good folks at DAW Books and Penguin Random House, to all my fans around the globe, my Hook Me Up! Gang, members of Team Gini new and old, all Alien Collective Members in Very Good Standing, Members of the Stampeding Herd, Twitter followers, Facebook fans and friends, Pinterest followers, the fabulous bookstores that support me, and all the wonderful fans who come to my various book signings and conference panels—you’re all the best and I wouldn’t want to do this without each and every one of you along for the ride.

  Special love and extra shout-outs to: my awesome assistants, Colette Chmiel and Joseph Gaxiola for continuing to fight the good fight of keeping me on schedule and somewhat coherent; Edward Pulley for allowing me to steal Joseph away all the time with good grace; Edward Pulley again for amazing and inventive Poof creations; Museum of Robots for giving me the excitement of a licensing deal made better because it’s with such an awesome company; Scott Johnson for continuing to allow me to stay at the nicest bed & breakfast spot in San Diego that’s also the oasis of calm in my book tours; Doug & Gen Cook for the opportunity to be “home” while on book tour; Beth Bartlett, Jan Robinson, Lisa Dovichi, Patience Fones, Kay Johnson, Andrea Hippauf, Kevin Bowman, Koleta Parsley, Mariann Asanuma, Vicki & Richard Kung, Stephanie and Craig Dyer, Chrysta Stuckless, Kelly Mueller, Anne Taylor, Michael & Mandi Shelton, Terry Smith, Christina Callahan, Lynn Crain for bestowing beautiful, supportive, wonderful, and delicious things upon me; Robert Palsma for continuously liking everything I do; Michele Sharik, Brian Pituly, and Brianne Lucinda for going long distances to see me; for a ton of physical labor and emotional support, special love to Duncan & Andrea Rittschof; Adrian & Lisa Payne, Duncan & Andrea Rittschof, and Hal & Dee Astell for always showing up and making every event all the better for your presence; and especially to the Authors of the Stampeding Herd—Barb Tyler, Lisa Dovichi, Hal Astell, Sue Martin, Teresa Cutler-Broyles, Phyllis Hemann, Terry Smith, Marsheila Rockwell, and Lynn Crain—I literally would not have finished this book without the competition with and support from all of you, and I’m proud to pound hooves with all y’all.

  Always last in the listings but first in my heart, thanks to my husband, Steve, who learned a lot of new drink recipes for me in order to ensure that I kept on writing, and our daughter, Veronica, who both encouraged me and kept me grounded. You both truly complete me and give me all the inspiration anyone could ever need.

  THERE’S AN OLD ADAGE—be careful what you wish for. I’ve already learned that it’s true—wonder for one moment if your life could be more interesting and “Whoomp! (There It Is)”, you’re killing a newly formed superbeing and discovering aliens are real, on the planet, and total hotties.

  Of course, that was so Twelve Operations Ago. I’ve gotten used to the excitement that is now my daily life, sorta, and the fact that, when push comes to shove, my brand of outside-the-box thinking and ability to just go with the crazy will save the day. It never ceases to amaze me, but at the same time, I know not to complain about things working out the way I’ve hoped they would. Well, mostly the way I’ve hoped they would.

  Of course, many times what I’ve hoped would happen has, but with catastrophic side effects no one had predicted. Okay, almost all the time. But sometimes, it’s kind of nice to see that little cosmic joke explode into someone else’s face.

  The Mastermind has been unmasked on national and international television, and our side stopped his latest bid to end the world. Go team.

  Oh, sure, he killed a lot of people we cared about and many innocents along the way, but that’s just par for the old Course O’ Evil. All things considered, and if we ignore that we hate even losing one person on the Side Of Right, we’ve kept the body count pretty low. At least for our side. It’s not nearly high enough on the evil side, but we do persevere.

  However, as our luck would seem to constantly have it, the Mastermind and seven of his cronies escaped. Always the way, am I right?

  On the supposedly plus side, this has left my alien husband the new President of the United States, which makes me the First Lady. The fact that I keep on being shoved into these public-facing positions where everyone knows I’m going to blow it and yet still acts totally surprised when I do is just the way the cosmos amuses itself, at least insofar as I can tell.

  Of course, if you’re going to inherit a position after the former owner of said position and half of his staff were murdered by your most dedicated enemy, there’s no one better than Jeff to take control and keep the populace calm and functioning. And we can but hope that my role will be small and not televised. Again and again and again. You know, just to mix it up and be different from all the other times.

  Oh, who am I kidding? We all know it’s going to be the Kitty Messes Up Again Show for the foreseeable future. But no worries, I have a plan.

  What is that plan, you ask? I’m going to channel The Cars and let the “Good Times Roll” while at the same time accepting that when Aerosmith sings about someone being “Crazy,” they’re singing about their Number One Fan. Who is me. In case you, like so many others, haven’t been paying attention.

  After all, what could possibly go wrong?

  Yeah, I’ll wait while everyone stops rolling around the floor laughing and catches their breath. Because Murphy and his Law are pretty much my copilots.

  CHAPTER 1

  “EXCUSE ME, President Martini, but we have a situation. It seems the Planetary Council is requesting foodstuffs that, ah, we don’t actually have on hand.”

  This whispered, worried statement was coming from the head of the White House’s household, the Chief Usher, Antoinette Reilly.

  She was an attractive black woman, a few years older than Jeff, and she’d been wearing a constantly worried expression for the past week. I’d met her before this, when the now-late President Armstrong was the man in charge, and she’d never seemed as ready to request immediate leave as she had been in the week and a half since his death.

  And she wasn’t the only one. We were already clearly stressing out the staff of the White House beyond their obvious expectations, and we hadn’t even officially moved in yet.

  “What could they possibly want that we don’t have?” Jeff asked, just as quietly.

  “It’s, ah, considered a delicacy. Apparently. Only we would need to import it from, ah, the Alpha Centauri system, and even if we could do so easily, Chef is flat-out refusing to make it. And,” Antoinette looked over to me, “ah, I can’t blame him.”

  Took the leap. “Oh my God, Alexander wants to have the horrid Alpha Four boiled tapeworms dish, doesn’t he?”

  Antoinette nodded. “Madam First Lady, could you please help?”

  “The formality of this new stage of my life is literally going to kill me. Can I order you and the rest of the staff to call me Kitty and have a hope of it sticking?”

  Antoinette smiled. It was the first smile I’d seen her crack in a week, so go me. “Possibly in private. But right now, we need your help. Formally.”

  Nodded, and turned to look down the long conference table. “Excuse me, Alex?”

  Emperor Alexander, Ruler of the Entire Alpha Centauri System—at least as far as anyone on Earth other than those of us who actually understood the political system over there knew—nodded his head toward me in a regal manner. “Yes, Kitty?”

  “Dude, you’re asking for food that makes humans literally want to barf their guts out. It’s a no-go. And anyone else requesting personal national or planetary specialties, up to and definitely including haggis, need to run those requests through me. So that I can say no in the nicest possible way.”

  “That wasn’t what we were going for,” Antoinette said quietly.

  “No problem, Kitty. But they’re really delicious,” Alexander said, sounding far more like what he really was—Jeff’s and his cousin, Christopher White’s,
younger relative who we’d put onto the throne of Alpha Four—than the Ruler of the Free Alpha Centauri Worlds.

  “Dude, gag me. Seriously. Never speak of those things again in my or any other human’s presence and we’ll continue to love you.” Turned back to Antoinette. “Learn this now—I may have been forced to be the American Centaurion Ambassador, but don’t for one moment think that I enjoyed the job. I get far better results by living by the cat motto of asking for exactly what I want. And that includes being the FLOTUS. By the way, FLOTUS really makes me feel like I’m costarring in a Finding Nemo spin-off as the chipper strip of seaweed that helps the gang save the day.”

  Antoinette was now clearly trying not to laugh. Or cry. Possibly both. Gave it even odds either way. “Duly noted, Madam First Lady.”

  “The less said about what movie that title makes me think I’m starring in, the better.”

  “Best Little Whorehouse in Texas?” Tim Crawford, the Head of Airborne for Centaurion Division, aka the guy doing what remained my favorite job on my entire resume, asked with a quiet snicker.

  “Got it in one.”

  Antoinette heaved a sigh. Had to figure I was going to generate that in her for the foreseeable future. She was a nice, smart, competent, capable woman, and I felt bad about stressing her out. However, we were still in Major Crisis Mode, and therefore me not being me wasn’t in our best interests.

  “So, now that we’ve had an entire week to collect ourselves, what do we do?” It was the day after the third day of State Funerals, otherwise known as the day we buried our friend and the late President of the United States, Vincent Armstrong, and this question was coming from, of all people, his widow, Elaine.

  The Former First Lady wasn’t normally included in matters of state, but we were possibly the most unconventional politicians the world had ever known, the former unwilling Vice President and even more unwilling President, also known as my husband, Jeff Martini, wanted her input, and the man who’d murdered her husband and so many others was still at large. As such, Elaine had joined Team Megalomaniac with gusto.

  Frankly, the Current First Lady wasn’t normally included in this stuff either, but—under the variety of circumstances that had, in just over six short years, moved me from a happy-go-lucky marketing manager into being a superbeing exterminator, the Head of Airborne, the Co- then Head Ambassador for American Centaurion, and now the wife of the President of the United States—my husband valued my input, and so my input would be inputted. This was a fast-track career path that college had definitely not prepared me for.