Chapter 51 - Kindling

Ursula sat in the command room on a call. She faced the door, not wanting to be overheard. The damaged dolls had been repaired, but the fact remained that someone had broken into the base. Ursula tampered with as much as she could to hide the data theft. But the situation was still dire. This put several things in jeopardy, least of which was her mission. The communicator beeped a few times until the secure line connected. "'Ursula?'"

"They've made their move."

"Understood. What's your status?"

"I managed to conceal the data theft. The Dolls won't notice, but I'm worried that the other commander might."

"We can have a transport there in under an hour." Ursula looked at the base cameras. Bryant's truck was just entering the first gate. She tapped the desk for a moment.

"...no. If I leave now, it just raises suspicion."

"Understood." The call disconnected and Ursula cleaned the call logs. She stood, straightened her jacket and walked out to meet Bryant. Yulia was still only at 30% but the repairs were going smoothly. The Dolls were scrambling to reinforce the entries to the base and fix the relatively minor damage.

Bryant stood talking with the security Dolls. Another A-Doll was nearby holding his tablet while he dictated. SOPMOD played with his empty sleeve and kept pace with him as he examined the mound of digital paperwork that had stacked up during his impromptu trip. When the two commanders locked eyes, Bryant gave her a sharp look.

"Bryant, I -"

"Commanders." SAR approached. "I'm sorry to interrupt, but Ms Helian has requested an immediate update." Bryant nodded to acknowledge Ursula then to SAR.

"Later, Ursula. Let's deal with this first." The two of them started off towards the communication room.

"Bryant, listen. It wasn't -"

"Ursula, things happen." He spoke over his shoulder. He sighed. "It was just bad luck. How bad were the damages?"

"Insignificant. They only made it through due to their explosives. They were disorganized and disillusioned: we chased them out with little effort." Bryant ground his teeth for a second before stopping.

"That sector is close to the warehouse. I'd like to help Kalin complete a full inventory." Ursula nodded and smirked.

"Already done. Everything is accounted for, minus the ammunition used to repel the attackers." She met Bryant's gaze and her smirk faded slightly.

"Then, if they weren't after the warehouse…" He turned to SOP, who hadn't stopped harassing him, "SOPMOD, get your sisters and do a full sweep of the network. Look for any intrusions." Ursula forced herself to maintain her composure. The Doll saluted and hurried off to find the rest of the AR team. The two continued in silence until they arrived at the communication room.

The call was already set up. Havier and Helian were discussing the business side of things. Once the commanders made themselves known, the Dolls were excused from the room. Havier was the first to speak. "Well done in Greece, commander. The tower is still standing, and no one important died." Bryant's face turned red. "My package was delivered. Regardless of how and who, it's safe in my hands now." He tapped his cane and leaned against his desk. "But I think we need to discuss what happened there."

The old man's eyes flickered for a brief moment. "Sangvis was able to infiltrate undetected and hacked or assimilated military hardware. IOP dolls are the finest civilian combat dolls in the world. However, I believe it is time to bring in a specialist to properly prepare for whatever plans Sangvis Ferri and…well, their Mastermind may have in store." He reached across the desk and added another individual to the call.

The logo for a company appeared on screen. "Hello, Griffin and IOP. I represent WAVE technologies. Mr Havier has asked us to provide some additional assistance. While we are not the only company interested in your organization, we are willing to take that leap of faith and begin our joint ventures. To facilitate this cooperation, we have asked Griffin to provide us with some tactical data."

Helian nodded. "We feel that old data is insufficient. So, we are calling for the best commanders Griffin has available. A joint training exercise, if you will. WAVE Technologies will take that information and help IOP support our operations against Sangvis Ferri. Ursula, Bryant; because of your involvement with our special forces team, you are being asked to join in the operation."

Bryant opened his mouth to object, but Helian cut him off. "Ursula will report to the primary location, while Bryant will remain at the WAVE Technologies monitoring site. We don't expect trouble, but better safe than sorry. You will be given temporary command over some support teams. The rest of your dolls will come with Ursula."

Bryant sighed and nodded. Ursula answered. "Yes ma'am. We'll be there." Havier clicked his cane and smiled.

"We have some more to discuss. Thank you, commanders."

The call disconnected. Bryant sighed. "Damn, I can't catch a break…" he stretched and turned to Ursula. "So….I guess we need to call a strategy meeting." Ursula nodded, thankful to avoid the earlier topics. Bryant motioned for USP to follow him as he left the room. "Who will you take?"

Ursula kept up and retrieved her own tablet. "Anti-Rain, Team SAR, and the Lancelet dolls. I'll bring Yulia's team as well…however her repairs won't be completed in time."

USP spoke up. "I'll go and support her team….if the commander allows it." Bryant thought for a moment before nodding.

"That's fine, USP. You need the experience." Bryant transferred leadership from Yulia to USP Compact. The doll saluted and left to speak to the team. Ursula nodded and left before Bryant could say anything. Bryant tried to say something, but before he could a call came through his tablet. It was M16.

"Commander?"

"What did you find?" There was some noise in the background, SOPMOD was being noisy. M16 cleared her throat.

"I'd rather speak in person. M4 found something." Bryant nodded and walked to the command room, where the AR team was waiting. The dolls were talking and examining a chunk of data. M4 turned to M16 to start the meeting. She in turn nodded to M4. Finally, AR-15 broke the silence.

"We found a network intrusion."

"Human?"

"Sangvis." AR-15 continued. She pulled up the network logs. Missing data, chopped timelines, and other obvious missing details. "It's hard to tell how badly the data was corrupted…but it's Parapluie. I recommend restoring from a backup." Bryant nodded and scratched his beard.

"How bad was the breech?" M4 finally recovered enough to speak up.

"Not much…the information they stole - if any - is already data they have acquired from the Sector. They would have only gotten recent combat data." Bryant pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed.

"Leave a detailed report of Sangvis' activities for Kalina. She'll need to be aware if anything changes while we're out." The dolls saluted and began compiling reports. M16 stopped the commander before he left.

"Commander…what are you thinking?" She smirked at him, almost seeing through him.

"It wasn't Sangvis. Even if these extremists had access to Parapluie, it wouldn't have left the hole it did. The information stolen isn't of any tactical significance. What's more, none of the Neural Cloud data was tampered with. That rules out both the Anti-Android factions and Sangvis." Bryant put his head down to think, his mind flashing back to the incident in Greece. M16 nodded.

"So…what do we want to do?" Bryant shook his head.

"...we can't do anything. Not yet." M16 nodded. She gave him a firm stare for a few seconds, as if trying to read his mind again. Satisfied, she turned to join her sisters. Bryant couldn't help but feel that something had been put into motion that he wasn't ready for.