TBoB - Book 2 - Chapter 46 - A Sticky Situation

Sorry this was posted so late - finished it later yesterday, and then immediately got distracted with a new story idea. My bad.

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“I fucking hate this,” I mumbled as I wiped the antithesis juices off my visor. The antithesis had sealed up every tunnel between us and our destination, and despite providing an entire squad of bears with thermal axes, in order to speed up our advance, progress was still slow. It didn’t help that the antithesis apparently still had forces hidden in the tunnels to harass us. The last wave even had a Model Twelve, which Bob had to smash against a wall to stop, completely coating me with its juice. Luckily my armor was environmentally sealed, or I’d be swimming in antithesis innards.

“How have they not run out of reinforcements by now?” Tina whined. “We must have killed thousands by now, but they never fully commit. Why not just rush us?”

“I don’t understand it either,” Whisperer replied as she took a few steps further away from me. “Plus it’s mainly been the chaff, like Threes, Fours and Fives, and the occasional Thirteens. The hive has the ability to produce Seventeens, where are the other higher models?”

“I don’t know, maybe they can’t crawl out of whatever space the Seventeens are hiding,” I grumbled, doing my best to de-goop my armor. “Maybe the Seventeens can’t control the big bastards, or maybe they’re just producing an army behind us, who the fuck knows.”

Everyone turned to look at me. “What?” I asked as I stood up straight, shaking the last of the residue off my gloves.

“It would make sense, given the circumstances,” Jesse said. 

I glanced back at the trio, slightly confused. “What would? Did I miss something here?”

“They might have a couple Model Twenty Threes crawling around behind us,” Whisperer replied. “It would explain why we’re being swarmed by waves of small models, instead of a huge frontal assault.”

“What the fuck is a Twenty Three?” I growled. “And why does everyone know about it?” 

“It’s a mobile hive,” Tina explained. “Eats up biomass, then pumps out the lower models. They’re usually used to bolster the front lines of a major assault, or produce satellite hives. I did some research following my first incursion, to find out about what models I might encounter in future encounters,” she said, glancing my way. “I heard you were fighting in Seattle, how have you NOT heard of them before?”

“I’ve never encountered one before,” I replied defensively. “I guess I could have looked up other models, but considering the number of times I’ve encountered fucked up mutants and variants I’d prefer to not waste my time on research. I have other things to do.”

“Well, I guess that’s your choice,” Whisperer said. I could hear a trace of disappointment in her voice, but chose to ignore it. “The question is, if they do have a Twenty Three or two behind us, do we go after them, or leave them?

“If we clean them up, it’ll make it easier for us to advance,” Tina said. 

“My bears aren’t built for pursuing an opponent,” I replied. “Plus, we don’t actually know if these Model Twenty Threes exist or not. It may be a waste of time.”

“I think it’s worth a try,” Jesse interjected. “Even if we can’t find the Twenty Threes, we should be able to follow those threads to the Seventeens. Taking care of those would probably slow down the attacks too.” 

“I agree,” Whisperer said. She reached up, and scratched her massive wolf pet under its chin. “If you don’t think your bears can keep up, Red here can track the nerve connections instead. The problem is the cave is too narrow, so I can accompany him, and even though he’s strong, I don’t know if he can hold off a small army long enough for the rest of us to catch up. He’d need backup.”

Tina’s hand shot into the air. “Oh Oh Oh… I think I can help with that.”

“Really? How?” Jesse asked.

“I’ve had my eye on a set of Class I power armor for awhile now, and even though I don’t have enough to get all the functionality I want, I can afford some of it,” the girl said proudly. “It should be fast enough to keep up with Red.”

“Spider themed, of course,” I said.

“Of course!” she replied with a smile. 

“I could probably attempt to follow as well, I have some bionics, but as you all know I don’t exactly specialize in combat. The best I could do is take a couple railguns and provide fire support.”

“I can keep up too!” came a call from behind. I turned to see Bob standing directly behind me. “I may not be able to jump too high, but I can build up quite a bit of speed once I get going.”

“He can talk?” Tina asked in surprise.

“It’s a recent upgrade, which pretty much bankrupted me, but yeah. Guess I forgot to mention that,” I replied.

The girl stared for a moment, then waved. “Hi.”

“Howdy!” Bob replied, with a robotic smile.

“Well, that would give us a pretty decent assault team,” Whisperer said. “So, do we do it?”

“I don’t see a reason why not,” I admitted. “As long as we don’t get in over our heads, I think shutting down the Seventeens would be a good idea. We could definitely advance faster if we didn’t have to deal with these coordinated attacks.”

“Then we’re all in agreement,” Jesse said. He glanced at his massive weapon, which was currently burning the facade off the back of one of the moose. “I also have enough points to get an upgrade or two, in order to hold the line here. I have enough to make a few purchases, while maintaining a surplus for emergencies.”

“Fine, rather than advancing right away, you two can spend a few minutes getting your gear. We needed to take a break anyway. Once you’re suited up we’ll discuss the best way to deal with the next wave,” Whisperer declared.

Tina and Jesse nodded, then went off to separate sections of the tunnel to prepare. After they left, Whisperer wandered over to me. “Do you honestly think this is a good idea?” she asked. “You didn’t exactly look happy with the idea.”

“No, but these attacks are slowing us down, and I don’t have any better ideas,” I replied with a shrug. “I don’t know if there are any Model Twenty Threes, like you guys suspect, but at least clearing out the Model Seventeens should prevent the rest of the swarm from coordinating.”

“That’s the hope,” Whisperer said. Red started whimpering behind us, which pulled her attention, so I wandered off to check on Jesse and Tina.

Jesse apparently had picked up a suit of heavy power armor. It wasn’t as big as Humboldt’s suit, but it was heavy, and apparently had an armature to mount his massive plasma cannon off of. It also had, what appeared to be a water tank on the back, to help keep the weapon cool. It looked a little bit like some sort of futuristic firefighter. A fire fighter designed to burn things. He also upgraded his rifle to something that looked closer to an LMG, which looked small when compared to his massive frame.

Tina, on the other hand, had something a little more exotic. Her power armor looked like the thorax and abdomen of a spider, with a human torso rising out of the front. It was large, and bulky, but indeed agile. As soon as she’d climbed into the suit, she started climbing the walls, cackling with glee as she did so. I watched her scramble around for a minute, climbing all the way to the roof, before embedding some sort of tow hook into the roof and repelling down.

“Whoh, headrush. No more walking on the ceiling until I can get rid of the vertigo,” she mumbled as she landed next to me.

“That’s an… impressive suit. You said it’s not even finished yet?” I asked.

“You mean it’s big, right?” Tina replied as she pulled off her helmet, a slight smile across her face. “I admit, it’s a lot more bulky than my original suit, but that’s intentional. My spiders are useful in combat, but get expensive to constantly replace, so I want to put a fabrication system in the abdomen. It takes up a lot of space,” she said, patting the back of her suit.

“I’m aware,” I replied. “I do have some experience with that sort of thing.” She looked at me a little strange, and started to ask a question, when Red started growling. Less then a second later Bandit sent me a warning. I really didn’t need it though, I could already feel the vibrations echoing through the tunnel.

“Guess we’re not going to get a chance to plan,” Whisperer shouted as she lifted her rifle. “The next wave is already coming, get ready!”