Apocalyptic Rebirth: With a repairman system space, she rises again.-Chapter 635: Crazy plan.

SLAM!

Warren’s fist hit the metal table with a deafening crack, making everyone jump. "And you’re telling us this now? You said you were keeping an eye on Ferry Island. You were supposed to check in on the town every hour and you just forgot!"

Lisha’s eyes bulged, her face turning a deep shade of red. "I didn’t ’forget,’ Warren! After the report said the base was safe, I had forty-five other red alerts screaming at me from the other bases! I’m one person! I had a lot on my plate, just like everyone else who was busy trying to keep the sky from falling down on us! More than half of us were searching for trapped residents and coordinating with rescue squads. Others were monitoring for..."

"Quiet. Both of you," Sunshine commanded. Her voice wasn’t loud, but it had the authority of a closing tomb. "Fighting each other is exactly what these rebels want. Luca is counting on us falling apart and blaming each other. An internal battle only affects us, not them."

She turned back to Lisha, her expression softening just a fraction_ the empathy of a leader who knew exactly what it felt like to be overwhelmed. "Lisha, I should have sent you help. You were overwhelmed because I did not think ahead. Now that we are here, can we track our people’s hardware? Even if the radios are jammed, what about their thermal bands?"

Lisha nodded quickly, grateful for the shift in focus. She tapped a series of commands, bringing up a list of serial numbers associated with the scout team. A grid of names appeared, each with a status light next to it.

One by one, the lights turned gray.

"Offline," Lisha whispered, her voice trembling slightly. "Every single one of them. Greg, Lucia, Ben, Sarah, the bands aren’t sending a pulse. They must have been destroyed. Someone knew we could track them this way and probably destroyed them."

Sunshine’s heart clenched. For her people to surrender their thermal bands, they were either in on it or someone stronger had taken them. Possibly, killed them!

Suddenly, a metallic clack-clack-clack sounded on the floor. Hunter trotted toward the main console. Hunter tilted her head at the screen, his mechanical eyes glowing with a soft blue light. "The thermal bands of the elite squad use a prime core, so they have a unique signature," the dog said, her voice a calm. "I can trace them even if they are ’offline’ to your normal sensors."

Warren blinked, looking confused. "Prime Core? What the heck is that?" 𝘧𝓇ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝘣𝓃ℴ𝓋𝑒𝑙.𝑐𝘰𝑚

Lisha and Sunshine both turned at the same time. "Shhh!" they hissed in unison. Warren threw his hands up in defeat, muttering something about being the only person in the room who didn’t get a manual.

Hunter didn’t wait for Sunshine’s authorization. A long, thin metallic antenna slid out from the top of her head. It began to spin slowly, connecting to the console table. The other antenna rotated, scanning for signatures human machines couldn’t catch. On the big screen, the map of Ferry Island suddenly blinked.

Small red pings started to appear.

"I have them," Hunter announced.

Twenty red dots were clustered together in a single location. They weren’t moving. But as everyone leaned in, a twenty-first dot appeared on the radar. It was far away from the others, moving steadily toward a group of people Hunter’s sensors captured using thermal heat. The dog had even drawn clear shapes of what appeared to be weapons in their hands. Their dots were green.

"Who is that?" Warren asked, pointing at the lone red dot.

Lisha rolled her eyes so hard it looked painful. "Read the screen, Warren. The tag says: GREG."

Warren’s face went dark. "Well, I guess it’s safe to say he’s, our traitor. That son of a bitch volunteered to lead the command base in Ferry Island. He must be helping these rebels."

Lisha shook her head, her fingers hovering over her keyboard. "We don’t know what’s actually happening over there! For all we know the real Greg could be dead...."

Warren scoffed and pointed a thick finger at the moving dot. "The thermal band was tailored to match unique characteristics of the wearer to prevent swaps and trades. That is Greg’s physique. He is relaxed. He is a rat."

Sunshine didn’t join the argument. She closed her eyes, trying to process the pain of the betrayal. Greg was a member of her elite squad. He had eaten at her table. He knew some of the base secrets. He was one of the few people who knew exactly where the sensors failed near the northern border. It all clicked into place—the silence, the stealthy entrance of the mercenaries, the broken radios and dead thermal bands.

"How do we handle this?" Warren asked, his voice losing its humor. "If we send the drones in to blast him, the mercenaries will see us coming a mile away. He probably told them all about them and they’re waiting for us to drop from the sky. Maybe they even have counter measures in place. If we drop a bomb on them, we could kill the hostages....I am guessing that is what our people are right now."

Sunshine opened her eyes. The sadness was gone, replaced by a sharp, dangerous spark. She bent over the console, staring at the grey, swirling mist on the map between Kingsbridge and Ferry Island.

"They are expecting an air strike," Sunshine said quietly. "They think we’re going to play by the rules and fly in with exo suits. But I say we do the opposite. We use the ground."

Warren looked at her like she had grown a second head. "The ground? They will see us crossing the bridge."

"Who said we are using the bridge?" Sunshine asked, a small, grim smile appearing on her face. "We are going through the mist. Vicente will control what he can, we also have the reddix pills for back up. We’ll use the fog as our own cloaking device. They won’t see us until we are close enough to see the color of their eyes."

Warren let out a loud, surprised laugh. "You are absolutely crazy, sister-in-law. You know that, right?"

"That I am," Sunshine replied, checking the sidearm at her hip. "But being sane hasn’t won us any war yet. Lisha, keep Hunter connected to the grid. I want Greg’s location updated every ten seconds."

"You got it," Lisha said, her pride in her tech finally returning. When this was over, she would seek for other experts and train them to do the job like her. Trust was thin, which was why she handled everything, but she had only two eyes and two hands.

Sunshine called Vicente and gave him instructions. Luca and his people were all waiting for death. As for Greg, he would be tried in public before being beheaded.

A traitor deserved no less.