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The original was posted on /r/hfy by /u/Lanzen_Jars on 2024-12-03 22:31:44+00:00.

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Chapter 196 – Never been a Saint

With a crackle, the tiny speakers hidden in the humans’ ears came to life as they pressed their way through the nervously riled-up crowd at an aggressive pace.

“Mission Control calling Carbon,” the familiar voice of the Admiral came through, carrying its usual professional tone with just a small hint of added urgency.

“This is Diamond. Carbon copies,” Andrej quickly replied from the front of the team, keeping his head down and his pace up as he answered the incoming call. “What do you have for us, Mission Control?”

James dodged the low-hanging arm of a young koresdilche as he listened in to the radio chatter, his face firm and stony as he wondered what she could possibly want from them now.

He didn’t have to wait long, because it barely took a moment before the Admiral’s voice came through once again.

“We just got new intel on one of the hostile’s positions,” she explained in a firm manner and seemed to want to get the information across as quickly as possible. “5561 Osteaclibur lane. A hidden cellar that can be reached through a hatch in the supply closet that can be opened via a control panel in the bathroom. Prepare for password confirmation.”

Everyone briefly turned their heads to glance at each other. New intel? Right now? Where’d that come from?

The Admiral wasn’t generally one to come through with intel if it wasn’t reliable. However…

“How’s your blood, Ma’am?” James asked through the line, taking over the conversation momentarily to ensure that that was actually his mother they were talking to.

“Runs like water,” his mother’s voice replied without hesitation, and James gave his team a subtle nod. Given what they knew about the language model that their opposition used against them, he doubted it had cracked that code. “Prepare for password confirmation, Carbon.”

“Copy, Ma’am,” Andrej took back over with a serious tone. “Ready when you are.”

Everyone went very quiet to listen as the code was dictated to them.

“Too. Tree. Sev-en. Nin-er. Nin-er. Fife. Fow-er. Fow-er. Wun. Ait,” the voice gave through, each of them committing the numbers to memory with various methods of trained memorization.

“Too. Tree. Sev-en. Nin-er. Nin-er. Fife. Fow-er. Fow-er. Wun. Ait,” Andrej returned in a practiced manner. As he did, his team both checked the numbers against their own recollection while also once again committing them to memory while listening for the second time. “Copy, Mission Control.”

“Confirmed,” the Admiral replied, verifying the password while the team already changed the direction of their push through the crowd to accommodate for their new target. “Be advised, the source of the intel is not clean. I repeat, the source is not clean. Proceed with appropriate caution.”

“Copy that, Ma’am. We’ll be careful,” Andrej confirmed while everyone adjusted to their new route and formed up around him once again. “Carbon out.”

Covering each other’s sides and flanks, the team of small primates became akin to a group of shadows, sliding through the tight but plentiful openings that were ripe for the taking for people their size.

“Any inkling what that’s about?” Admir asked into the silence after a bit. Seeing as they had a good bit of ground to make before they would even get close to the new target, he likely decided that constant silence wasn’t the way to go for the meantime.

“Whatever it is, it’s probably time-sensitive,” Athena replied from the other side of the formation, though obviously their voices were all joined together through the same channels in each other’s ears.

“If it is then we were never going to make it in time,” Tuya assumed, clearly weighing the way they had ahead of them against the idea of needing to get anywhere in a timely manner. “If they so much as dream that we’re coming, they’ll be long gone before we get close.”

“Yeah, but the quicker we are, the more they may have to leave behind to make it,” Admir countered with a hint of pondering in his voice. “Presumably, at least. Unless we suddenly had a random breakthrough on deciphering one of their frequencies, this intel likely comes from some other busted ambush-attempt. At least that’s my best guess.”

“Makes sense with the unclean source,” Athena confirmed after a moment of thought. “You think they weren’t expecting one of their own singing?”

“Or they were counting on exactly that,” Tuya gave back for consideration. “But that only leaves us back at square one. Still, considering they used enough powder to blow half a city block last time, we should probably keep the possibility in mind.”

Everyone briefly gave some sort of confirmation.

In the meantime, James gently bit his lip. This could definitely be another trap. At this point, that was almost becoming the norm rather than the exception. Still, something about the situation was different.

For all their differences, he knew his mother wasn’t quite so easily duped. If she gave them this intel with the sense of urgency that she had, there was a good chance she had reason to believe it was a hot trail.

Of course, that didn’t make a trap any less likely. It did, however, make it more likely that the bait was a lot more valuable this time. If they could snatch the cheese this time, maybe it would get them somewhere.

Despite all their skepticism about their own pace, the team reached the Osteaclibur lane soon enough. The entrance to what appeared to be a somewhat ‘upper class’ area, even for this neighborhood, was distinguished by the statue of the street’s name-sake member of the first Galactic Council.

Unlike the many other statues around the place which were modeled after Captain Uton and meant to display an “average” yet idealized simmiareskis, the depiction of Osteaclibur was one of a shorter, stouter monkey with thicker fur and a tail that was only half as long as it should have been, presumably after suffering some sort of injury.

The at this point ancient silver-back had a grumpy expression on his wide face, and even in this immortalization of his form, his thick fur was patchy and unkempt in places, straying away from his skin in every which way, almost as if he had just rolled out of bed.

“Must have been quite the character,” Admir commented, glancing up at the larger than life depiction as they all quickly moved past it.

In his mind, James had to agree. For all they were propped up to be these days, he couldn’t help but think that the first Council was most likely not all that different from the people that lived today – and they were certainly far from some strange, mythological figures.

An odd but also strangely comforting thought to have in a time like this.

Holding their formation, they pressed onward into the half-gated community. At this point, they had moved far enough that the crowd had significantly thinned out, though there was still a noticeable number of people out on the street, seemingly just loitering.

So far away from anything interesting that was happening, a bit of suspicion crept up on all of them. Were these people just out and about? Or did they have a reason for standing this far back?

And even if they were just bystanders, having so many of them here still wasn’t good. If something was about to explode, it was almost certain that someone was going to get caught up in it.

“Really prefer the jungle to this many civvies…” Athena grumbled as she looked around, before turning her attention towards the Major. “Should we clear them out?”

Andrej released an almost chirping sound as he sucked in air through a small gap between his tongue and his teeth.

“Let’s see what the target looks like first,” he stated and gestured for everyone to go a bit quicker. “Keep your guards up.”

“Copy,” everyone else replied as they picked up their pace.

Obviously, the group of uniformed and armed humans was getting some strange looks as they passed by. Judging by the faces of some of the bystanders, there were definitely a good few among them who seemed to recognize just who that was hurrying past them there with a huge gun in his arms, though some also seemed like they thought they were just seeing ghosts.

A good chunk of them surely didn’t expect to see one of the Council Candidates to rush past them in such a situation of all times, thus thinking they must’ve imagined something or confused him for someone else.

Still, James kept a close eye on everyone’s reactions. Just in case someone was maybe a little too surprised to see him here.

“That’s the house,” Tuya soon called out as the first to get a direct visual of the correct address, with everyone else quickly following her gaze right before then looking everywhere else in a quick scan of the perimeter.

This deep into the street, the density of people had definitely lessened once again, though there was still a good chunk of them out on their feet.

“Coal, Carbonado, you’re on. Everyone else, cover,” Andrej ordered, causing everyone to move right away while giving brief confirmations.

Although, it did seem to give one of them a bit of pause, as Tuya turned her head towards the Major briefly to look at him a bit incredu…

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