Chapter 77: Pulse (II)
At five thirty the building began waking up with the particular early morning energy of a group that had been briefed the night before and had processed the information overnight and arrived at the morning ready to work.
Cole’s group was in the courtyard at five forty with the east face blast wall materials queued. Damon’s four were at the lobby entrance. Shin and Rei were at the anchor point positions by five fifty.
Michael stood in the courtyard and looked at the group assembled in the pre dawn grey and felt the particular weight of a building that had been building toward this moment for forty days.
He looked at the pulse.
The three variant signatures were still consolidated in the northeast. The Aberrant group was still stationary at five blocks southeast.
Still waiting.
But the consolidation had happened and the forty six hour stationary period was still running and both of those things together said the window between now and whatever came next was measured in hours not days.
He looked at the assembled group.
"East face blast wall today," he said. "Same sequence as north, same confirmation protocol. Shin and Rei on anchors, Cole’s group on materials, Damon’s four on panel placement." He looked at each face in the grey morning light. "Gareth is on the watchtower. Any signal from him means stop what you’re doing and listen." He paused. "We build until we hear otherwise. Questions."
No questions.
"Let’s go," he said.
The east face blast wall operation began at six and the building moved into the particular focused rhythm of a full materials day and Michael moved between the placement positions and the lobby and the pulse monitoring and kept building and kept watching and kept the two pictures in his head simultaneously, the east face panels going in one by one and the pulse showing him the consolidated variants in the northeast and the Aberrant group southeast, all of it at once, the integrated system running in every direction.
The first panel seated at six twenty.
Rei confirmed the anchors. Twice. Nodded.
Michael confirmed the second position and kept going.
---
Maya came to him at eight with the turret control tablet she’d been using for the familiarization sessions and a look on her face that said she’d been thinking about something since before she came down.
"The zone priority configuration," she said.
He looked at her. "How do you know about that."
"I checked the panel this morning before anyone else was up," she said. "I check it every morning as part of the familiarization protocol I set for myself." She held his gaze. "The configuration changed overnight."
"I reconfigured it at four this morning," he said.
She looked at the tablet. "Zone based manual priority instead of speed based universal," she said. "It’s better for the threat picture we have. The variant approach gets northeast and southeast dedicated coverage and the Aberrant mass approach gets the southwest and southeast primary zone which is where their approach originates." She paused. "The west face double coverage."
"The chamber west access," he said.
She nodded. "I would have done the same thing." She paused. "Almost. I would have given the north face mid a secondary coverage allocation from the northwest turret rather than relying entirely on the blast wall to cover that gap."
He pulled up the coverage analysis.
She was right. The northwest turret had spare capacity in its primary zone coverage that could extend a secondary arc to the north face mid without compromising the primary coverage.
He looked at her.
"Give me the tablet," he said.
She handed it over and he made the adjustment and ran the coverage analysis again and the north face mid gap reduced from a coverage gap to a partial overlap which was meaningfully better.
He handed the tablet back.
"Good catch," he said.
She looked at the updated coverage display on the tablet. "I’ve been running threat scenarios in my head since the briefing last night," she said. "The east and west simultaneous approach with variant speed differential was the one that kept coming out worst on the turret coverage picture." She paused. "The zone configuration helps. The northwest turret secondary arc closes it properly."
He looked at her. "You’ve been running threat scenarios."
"Someone should," she said simply.
He looked at her for a moment. "What else came out badly in the scenarios."
She looked at the tablet. "The variant speed in the interior if they get through the blast wall," she said. "The blast wall channels any breach to specific points but if a variant gets through a channel point at full speed the ground team response time is compressed to the same window as the outside contact drill." She paused. "The inside drill works in open space. The blast wall channels don’t give full movement range."
He thought about the blast wall interior geometry and the interior channels it created between panels and the movement constraints of a channeled space.
"Modified contact approach for channeled space," he said.
"Sera needs to know," Maya said.
"Tell her," he said. "You identified it, you brief her."
Maya looked at him. "She’s going to ask me to run the drill with her."
"Probably," he said.
She looked at the tablet. "Alright," she said and went to find Sera.
*[Bond Event — She Ran The Scenarios: Maya. +1 Bond Point. Current BP: 9 — Maya.]*
---
At ten fifteen Gareth sent two sharp pulses from the watchtower.
Michael felt it on the comm system the moment it came through and was moving before the second pulse finished.
He was at the base of the watchtower stairs in forty seconds and at the top in twenty more and Gareth was at the railing with the notebook open and his eyes on the southeast and his jaw set.
"The Aberrant group moved," Gareth said without turning around.
Michael pushed the pulse southeast immediately.
Four blocks.
They had moved one block closer. From five blocks to four. The first movement in forty six hours.
He looked at the pulse signature and felt its shape and the mass of it and counted as precisely as the density allowed.
Fifty one signatures. More than the initial estimate of forty seven.
He looked northeast. The three variant signatures were still consolidated. Still stationary.
"They moved one block," he said.
"While we were fully engaged on the east face materials operation," Gareth said. "The same timing as before. They wait for the building to be externally active and they move."
Michael looked at the courtyard below where the east face operation was still running, materials moving and panels going in and the full external visible activity of a building mid build.
"They saw the materials operation," he said.
"Fourteen block pulse range," Gareth said. "But from elevated position with line of sight over the wall you can see courtyard activity directly. They don’t need the pulse. They can see the courtyard from four blocks if they’re at height."
Michael looked at the park area four blocks southeast where the Aberrant group was positioned. The park had mature trees. Some of them were tall enough that an elevated position in them would have direct sightline over the building’s wall.
"They’re in the trees," he said.
"Some of them," Gareth said. "The observers. The rest are on the ground." He looked at Michael. "They’ve been watching from elevation the whole time. Every time we go outside in force they see it and they move."
Michael looked at the four block signature.
Four blocks. At Aberrant speed, which Dr. Kang’s notes had put at faster than human baseline but not variant Stalker fast, four blocks was approximately four minutes of full approach. The turrets would engage at the wall perimeter. The blast wall would engage whatever got through. The ground team would handle whatever got through that.
He looked at the east face operation still running in the courtyard.
"How many panels left," he said.
"Seven," Gareth said. "Based on the sequence timing."
Seven panels. At current pace that was forty minutes of courtyard activity.
He looked at the pulse.
Four blocks. Stationary again now that the movement had stopped. Watching.
He looked at the variant signatures northeast. Consolidated. Waiting for whatever signal the Aberrant group was going to give.
He made a decision.
"We finish the east face," he said.
Gareth looked at him.
"Seven panels," Michael said. "Forty minutes. The turrets are configured, the blast walls are running sequence, the chamber is stocked, the evacuation is briefed." He looked at Gareth. "We finish the wall we’re building."
Gareth looked at the southeast and then at the northeast and then at Michael with the no easy look version of his face completely present.
"If they move during the last forty minutes," he said.
"The turrets engage at perimeter," Michael said. "You pull the external team in the moment movement starts. The gate closes. The interior team positions on the blast wall." He looked at Gareth. "You’re the watchtower. You call it the moment it moves."
Gareth held his gaze for a long moment.
"Alright," he said and turned back to the railing.
Michael went back down.
---
He told Cole at the bottom of the stairs in fifteen words.
Cole looked at the courtyard and then at the pulse relay and then at Michael and said "understood" and went back to the materials operation without changing his pace which was the most useful thing Cole could have done and he did it immediately.
Michael went to the east face and stood beside the operation and watched the panels go in and kept the pulse running continuously and felt the four block Aberrant signature sitting southeast and the consolidated variants northeast and built the wall panel by panel while the city held its breath.
Panel five of seven seated at ten forty.
Shin confirmed anchors. Twice. Nodded.
Panel six at eleven fifteen.
Rei confirmed anchors. Twice. Nodded.
Michael looked at the pulse.
Still four blocks. Still stationary.
Panel seven setup began at eleven forty.
He watched it go in. The materials placement, the panel lifting, the anchor bolt sequence beginning. Shin moving to the first anchor point. Rei at the second.
The pulse moved.
Not the Aberrant group. The variants.
Northeast. The three consolidated signatures broke apart simultaneously and began moving west, fast, the particular speed signature of variant Stalker movement that was different from standard Stalker on the pulse in a way he could now identify immediately.
Coming toward the building.
At the same moment the Aberrant group southeast began moving.
Not one block at a time. All of them. The full mass of fifty one signatures accelerating from stationary to approach pace simultaneously like something had thrown a switch.
Michael activated the building wide alert before the thought was fully formed. Three pulses. Contact imminent.
He looked at the seventh panel half seated on the east face with the anchors not yet confirmed.
He looked at Shin.
She was already looking at him with the axe in her hand and the panel assignment forgotten.
"Leave it," he said as everyone then turned and moved.
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