Chương 432: Book 7 - Chapter 28 - Restless

As I leaned back in my chair, my mind flicked between the Bears who were escorting Mako and her friends around; the Otter that was zipping back and forth, skirmishing with a couple aqua bears in the ocean below the Strato carrier; and the team monitoring the sensor nets on the bridge. I knew I was supposed to be relaxing, grabbing a quick meal before going out to meet my guests, but I couldn't help but keep an eye on everything going on.

After spending a week on the front line and barely having time to think, never mind eat or rest, I was feeling more than a little restless. Even though I knew we were doing everything we could to hunt the Gene Tender and corner it as quickly as possible, the slow progress and my inability to assist as much as usual was starting to wear on me. I sighed, wandered over to the stove, and dumped a huge pile of veggie slices I'd prepared into the air fryer.

Jane would probably kill me if she knew that I was having a meal of nothing but veggie chips, but honestly, I didn't care at this point; I just wanted some comfort food. As I triggered the device, my mind wandered, connecting to the bears a couple corridors away. It seemed that Mako and the others were pleased with the modest accommodations and were busy settling in to the largest of my conference rooms.

Switching to the bears below I briefly watched as the Otter deftly outmanuvered the tentacled bear that was pursuing it, ducking into a wreck that was too tight for the scooter to fit into, then popping out of another hole, taking some shots at the bear's flank. It really did seem like the Otters would be a better option than the bears; They were just as fast as the scooters, far more agile, and even more accurate while under water.

I really wish I'd just done the smart thing and purchased them originally, instead of trying to make the bears viable. This had been the fifth match between the otter and the bear, and I'd seen enough. I connected to the bears running the Matter Reconfigurators and had them start to adjust the production queues. Stopping production of both replacement bears, scooters, and aquatic armor, and replacing them all with otters and a handful of weapons that Sharron had allowed me to purchase from the Deep Dweller catalog.

The Class III machines could each crank out a squad of otters an hour, so I could have a decent-sized force by the end of the day. I just hoped it would be enough. Through the eyes of the bridge crew, I could see that Spooky had not only managed to plug the hole that had been ripped in the southern side of the sensor net, but somehow he'd almost managed to get back on schedule. Since we'd lost about half the Ursas, I'd given him permission to use the Kodiaks to help cover for the losses.

What I didn't expect was that, despite having to use bears to throw buoys out of the back of the APCs by hand, he'd found a way to optimize the process enough to make up for lost time. I guess the fact that he could stuff the entire transport area full of buoys, close to a dozen of them, when the Ursas only carried four it made a difference. Just as I was about to disconnect, I noticed a handful of buoys on the holo table flicker. [Spooky?] I projected through the command network.

[I saw it, and I'm not sure what that was,] the bear replied as he wandered from his position at the front of the bridge back towards the planning rooms. [When the leviathans passed through, they triggered the network for a good ten to fifteen seconds each. It was a strong, constant signal. The sensors are only supposed to trigger when a large enough creature passes through, so if it was just a single sensor, I might have dismissed it as a sensor error, but multiple? I don't have an explanation.] Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there. I stared at the table for a couple seconds, silently watching as the flickering spread to the next buoy in the network, before making a snap decision. [Fire the missiles, full salvo. I want you to saturate the area just inside the net with damage, then send whatever aquatic units we have to investigate,] I ordered. [Pardon?] Spooky replied. [Full salvo?] [The buoys are designed to detect any moderately sized creatures passing between them, correct? What if something smaller than the set threshold passed through?] I asked. [They wouldn't be able to set it off, it was set that way to limit the number of false positives,] Spooky replied. [And what would happen if a ton of small things passed through at the same time?] I asked. [They probably wouldn't trigger it, unless…] Spooky said, trailing off.

[Unless they were pressed so close together they might register as something larger temporarily,] I finished. A couple of the buoys started blinking, indicating something human-sized was probably passing through the net. I immediately cut all my remote links, stepped back from the oven, and started running towards the door. [Either we've got a massive migration of sealife all passing through our net at the same time, or the Tender summoned more backup. Fire missiles, and don't stop until reinforcements arrive in the area.] [Roger that,] Spooky replied. As I stepped into the hallway, I felt the ship shudder under my feet. Normally I wouldn't have been able to detect a launch, even with all my enhancements. There were dozens of layers of both structural reinforcement and soundproofing between me and the missile silos. When the ship fired all two dozen at once, well, it was difficult to hide that.

I sprinted through the corridors as fast as I could, making my way towards the guest area. Just as I skidded around the last corner, I saw the door to the conference room slide open and Mako step out. It looked like she was going to ask the bears stationed outside the room something, but when she saw me, she turned my way instead, a frown on her face.

"Is something going on? What's with all the shaking? I thought this thing would be too large to encounter turbulence," she said.

"It is!" I shouted as I jogged up.

"Those are the missiles firing. Something's coming through the net, again!" Mako stood up straight.

"Another leviathan? Already?" I shook my head.

"It looks like a swarm, a big one. I ordered Spooky to saturate the area with ordinance, and I plan on informing the others, but we're the closest to the breach by far," I replied.

"I have a couple aquatic troops available, but not many. Do you think you and the others can stem the tide until reinforcements arrive?"

"Assuming that there aren't any surprises, like that EMP, absolutely," she replied.

"How big and how many are we talking about?"

"I don't know," I replied, shaking my head.

"The first wave was full of small stuff, Model One equivalents, but there were Model Three and Four sized creatures starting to come through when we started firing." I flicked my attention to the bears standing around the strategic table, then back again.

"They're still coming too. The larger ones have been crossing for close to a minute now, and they're still coming," I said. Mako nodded, then stepped back to the still-open door.

"Antithesis inbound! Come on girls, we've got work to do!"

"Already?" I heard someone ask.

"I guess we made the right choice by moving our base of operations."

"I don't suppose we could borrow some transport?" Mako asked when she pulled her head back out of the room.

"Of course, the one that ferried you all up here is still down in the hangar, and even though most of my Kodiaks and Ursas are out deploying buoys, there are still a few on standby. Let me know if you need more."

"No, that'll be fine, thanks," Mako declared before turning away from me and muttering.

"Just has a couple vehicles on standby… Most of us only have one." I smiled, despite myself.

"I'm not good in the water, so I'm going to head to the bridge and inform the rest of the fleet. I'll send my troops to meet you in the hangar," I said.

"Good luck down there."

"Luck?" Mako replied, giving me a toothy smile.

"Who needs luck when you have skills like ours? Just watch, we'll have this cleaned up in no time."