#55:Banana Slug -Barges

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days later

Why did it always happen to him? Carl often asked himself that. He was on duty monitoring the the bug-swarm. It seemed that he always got the graveyard shift. He didn’t mind really but when something bad happened he had to wake people up. Sometimes they didn’t deal well with being woke up at three in the morning by a little boy. Especially by Carl.

Carl had a history.

What to do? What to do? Perhaps someone was still awake in the Wizard’s keep. The ArchMage maybe, the other Maggi not to mention the RowdyBunch had been known to pull all nighters in there.

Carl would try that first. Maybe he’d luck out and not get a butt chewing. The fact that they always apologized later didn’t help much.

He initiated a video call. He wasn’t all that good at text.

“Hello?” Cody answered.

“Thank GAWD it’s you.” Carl said. Cody was a good kid. He didn’t make fun of Carl like many of the other’s did. “We have a problem.”

“What kind of problem?” Cody was awake, but just barely.

“Something is coming downriver at us.” Carl said “A lot of somethings actually if I read the bug-eyes right.”

“Why don’t you contact a grownup?” Cody asked.

“They always yell at me.” Carl replied uneasily.

Cody thought about that. It was true. People seemed to yell at Carl a lot. Oh well. Best to put out this grass fire first then worry about that later.

“I’ll wake someone up” Cody said. “You keep monitoring. Get as much information as you can.”

Cody turned to one side and noticed Akatsuki perched on the back of a chair.

“I’m someone, I’m awake. I’ve taken care of it.” the little Dragon said.

Cody said “Did you hear that bout Carl? About people yelling at him all the time?”

Akatsuki nodded “I did. Something has to be done about Carl. But not just now. I woke up Joshua. He’ll be here in a minute.”

..............

Joshua , Akatsuki and Cody flew into the Control room. Almost everyone else was asleep. No one was too alert after midnight.

“Lots of stuff floating toward us.” Carl said. “I didn’t wake you up did I? I hate it when people yell at me when I wake them up. You’re not going to yell at me are you?”

“No one is going to yell at you Carl.” Akatsuki said “You did exactly right.”

“Let’s see what’s happening” Joshua yawned then accessed the bug swarm.

“Oh Shit!” he said calmly, then pushed the “Red Button.” so to speak. He called Shelby and Chad both.

....................

Shelby and Chad were there in an instant. If it hadn’t been for the development of the Omni-suits neither one of them would have been dressed. They literally dressed on the way. They’d probably each broken some records getting here that that quickly, if not the sound barrier. Chad especially since he had been with Cody’s mother. They had been looking at etching. Yeah. That was it. Etchings. That was his story and he was sticking to it.

“What’s up?” Chad asked Shelby after he bumped off a wall or two while stopping. It didn’t seem to bother Chad any but the wall suffered. That dent wasn’t going to buff out.

“Lotsa floatie things coming our way” Shelby was in VR accessing the BugEyes. Radar and Sonar was slowing making it’s way to all the BugEyes but they didn’t all have it yet. The fog was still a hindrance.“Barges it looks like. A great many of them actually.”

“Oops.” Chad said.

Everyone was silent for a bit thinking about the situation.

Shelby said “Let me check one thing.”

“What’s that?” Chad asked.

“Recall when you first developed the ScooperPooper?” Shelby asked.

“Recall how they, er, extruded tall levees around Rock Island? “ Shelby asked before he could answer.

“Recall how the Levee’s were pointy up river in anticipation of this very thing?” Shelby asked before he could answer.

Chad waited. Was that all? Would he be interrupted before he could answer?

“I have coffee” a female voice spoke in the lull.

“MOM! What are you doing here?” Cody exclaimed.

“Serving coffee” she said then looked at Chad “It’s time.”

“Yeah I think so too.” Chad replied. “let’s put out this brushfire first.”

Cody pretended to be oblivious to the by play. In reality he was ecstatic. It was about freaking TIME!

Shelby said.” Wilbur, you and the Rowdy Bunch get some Bottom Feeders behind us. Try to push the oncoming barges away. The water is too deep for the Scooper-Poopers to be of any use.”

Wilbur, Cody and others of the Rowdy Bunch did that. They were all tele-operating the large bottom feeders, the one’s that looked like huge catfish that were the size of small whales. The BF’s didn’t swim very fast but they were faster than a drifting barge, and strong. They were using the BF’s as tugboats and were pushing the oncoming barges away from the BananaSlug.

In dense fog.

They’d had easier jobs before than this.

........................
The Next Episode Is
#56: Banana Slug -Missed One…
The Previous Episode was
#54:Banana Slug- FOG…
The First Episode was
# 1 : Prologue…
..............
Book One: SoulStone
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