Packed for Transport

Electrons arrived on the Shorty Shuttle, and a number of regular recruits were forwarded over by some of the middle layers of the electron network. The Uns had their process down, accepting new members and rapidly imparting the special knowledge necessary to be a functional member of their flexible sensor team. There was nary a glitch as the regular recruits mixed into the intake system of the Uns.

Four doublings and three more were delivered to the original quad of quads. The Uns had set up a small training zone on a nearby meshwork, large enough to practice the process of quad deployment. Each quad was outfitted with three expander electrons and a driver that stayed with the quad by sneak-pairing with the four electrons in the quad. The whole team of eight Electrons fit nicely on a shorty with room enough to bring a second team aboard if necessary.

Shorties made the ideal delivery mechanism, since they could mode-swap and travel either through a One-Eight-One soup or along the chains of Sixes that were studded with Ones. Penetrating into the outer layers of some key channels was necessary in order to set up a cross-sectional temporal tap, injecting the intelligent array of linked Electrons. When properly positioned, a single shorty could roll across a meshwork, catching new seven-electron groups as shorties brushed the flying Seven end, and deploying them across the meshwork. Reverse the process, and the brushing shorties picked up groups that were waiting for pickup. Doing both at the same time was the norm, just to keep everything in balance.