He was already worrying about what to do if disappointment hits them after two weeks. While uncertainty is bad, its effect is slow-acting. But the negative effect of failed expectations would be an explosive crash.
Even mentally strong people who could hold on for two weeks of uncertainty might not be able to bear the disappointment after using the expectations of two weeks as their foundation to hold on.
He thought about tying up the soldiers. That way they won't be able to wreak havoc within their host.
Of course, that was bound to make things worse. He knew that if he did that, the soldiers would feel like they were prisoners. The mental collapse would increase greatly because of it.
He sighed and rubbed his face. Then he said, "I hate being the leader."
Fortunately, things didn't reach the point where he had to knock out his fellow soldiers so that he could tie them up without them resisting. Just after a week of looking for a target, the librarian informed him that it had found one.
The voice of the librarian spoke in his mind, "I have found an infested community. Prepare your men."
This notification also came with visual information of the target that had been found. He saw a three-dimensional image of the target, so he knew that the Wayfarer was smaller than the one he was currently in.
He said outloud to the librarian, "Keep me updated on the situation."
Then he said to the soldiers, "Man up. We've come up onto a target. Prepare for breaching in five minutes."
His soldiers jumped onto their feet immediately. Then they began scrambling for their equipment.
Soon the wayfarer they were in stopped. By that time, the men had prepared the launcher.
The launcher was made of non-magnetic metals. Even the missile was made with the same material. If not, just the magnetic winds would be able to interfere with the missile and blow it away.
The men ran to where the mouth of the wayfarer was. When the wayfarer opened its mouth, they ran out of it and found the target rushing past them.
After identifying the target, the men pointed the rocket launchers at them and launched the rockets.
Three rockets out of nine were launched at once. They waited for the outcome of the first volley before launching the second one.
The target was moving quickly and also far away, so it was difficult to tell the situation. The darkness and the loud winds didn't help either. But there were soldiers with good eyesight in the team who spotted that the first volley was successful.
The next part was up to Kelvin and another speedster. The rest of the soldiers returned to the wayfarer while he ran to catch up with the target.
The target had been shot in three separate places. So three openings should have been made in its shell.
The job of the two of them is to find any of these three openings and deposit the explosives they have with them into the openings. They are to do that under the protection of their allied wayfarer.
They had three types of explosives. Napalm, shrapnel, and acid explosives.
The goal is for the explosives to injure the internal organs of the targeted wayfarer. This will slow it down and weaken it. It will make it easy for their wayfarer to defeat and stop it.
The plan was clear to the two of them. They had rehearsed it many times during their eight days of doing nothing.
But just as he took off, he heard a roar of pain from the target. The target also stopped moving. It was both good news and bad news.
He said, "It seems like we are not needed."
Apparently, the wayfarer had been critically injured by the acid missiles. One of the missiles had deposited its acidic content close to where the organs of the wayfarer were. Then the acid went to work on both the shell and the organs attached to it.
This was good news. It meant that they wouldn't have to waste time and risk more lives stopping the target.
But it also meant that the two people had rehearsed for eight days for nothing. They weren't going to be able to do the one job that was assigned to them. It made them unsatisfied.
Kelvin didn't waste time after the target had slowed down. He only waited for the confirmation from the librarian that the target had indeed been injured and had begun to weaken. Then he instructed the librarian to make the wayfarer bring the other soldiers to the target.
Meanwhile, he and the other speedster went ahead to the target. Their job was to perform a visual analysis on the three entries and determine which one was best for the infiltration of the soldiers.
The librarian was also doing this. When the wayfarer brought the soldiers over, the librarian and Kelvin compared the information that they had acquired and settled on one of the entries.
After the two of them had settled on the point of entry, the soldiers then formed up for the infiltration.
Kelvin was standing in front of a hole in the shell of the target. This hole had a height the size of a car.
The hole was 1.5 meters in length. It was a little short for the soldiers, but it was wide so they could squeeze themselves through it.
This hole is not the biggest of the three. There are bigger holes in the shell of the target, but this one is the easiest to access for everyone.
The soldiers were arranging themselves in front of the hole according to the formation that they had practiced. They had practiced this formation many times both for the mission and for entertainment since they didn't have much else to do. So the soldiers were very familiar with the formation.
Kelvin watched them while also keeping an eye on the hole to make sure that nothing came out through it to attack them.