#odyssey

A smile. “That is good. To answer your question from earlier- yes, you may visit. With notice, would be best, but if there is an urgent matter, you will not be turned away.”

"Thank you. If you have need of a strong arm for a time, and my lieges do not forbid it, let me know as well. You are kin to my friends. THat is not an empty thing to me"

And she gives a trollish salute instead of a bow, and steps back to let the woman enjoy her grand children

A nod, and she goes back to doing just that.

Meanwhile, Thistle has what she feels confident is a workable mk 1 of a fiber optic cable. Granted, it’s not her speciality, but she thinks if she had the initial cable in her knobby hands, she could find a way to keep the sharks off.

She's drawn in more than a few old-timers and lookie-loos.. and Dayana!

Dayana squints at the diagram. One of the Selkies shoulders her aside to jab a finger at the drawing. “Spikes are too short. A spike like that, won’t pierce the roof of a biggun’s mouth to deter him from chomping.” The muscular lady has the look of a seasoned fighter.

Scribble-scribble!

Dayana frowns, but gives way. Another scrappy younger man suggests, “What about barbs?”

The muscular woman shakes her head. “They’ll catch and then thrash - rip your cable right out of the moorings.”

Harrumph. "I still vote for boring."

“Boring?” The woman questions.

“nothing boring about a shark attack.”

"No, we want bored sharks!"

“Hmm. How are you going about that? The electricity lures them in, is what they think. They can sense it, like they sense the life in what swims in their waters.”

"So muffle or baffle it..."

Dayana has inched back around to the other side of the table. “Can you muffle it without reducing the signal? If the signal degrades, the work is for naught.”

"I know that..."

"Tell me again why we can't bury a pipe?"

A twitch in the eye of one Selkie, and another just laughs. “… under the ocean floor?”