It took a lot longer to clear out the vegetation than I expected. Not only was it a lot more extensive than I imagined, but it grew back extremely quickly. In the end, we had to exhaust the hive's entire reserve of biomass, or energy, or whatever it was using to grow back before we could finally kill it.

  The birthing pods, which we couldn’t find earlier, ended up being right under our noses. Like the defensive heads, they were hidden under the carpet of greenery. It turned out there was a deep crevasse on the other side of the room which connected to an entirely separate set of tunnels underneath the hive.

  Even though it looked like these pods might have been active right up until we discovered the crevasse, we couldn’t find any sign of any antithesis at the bottom. The abnormal behaviour was concerning, but unfortunately we didn’t have the time to hunt down every single model in the tunnels, at least not right now. It was something we’d have to leave for the cleanup crew.

  Before we returned to the surface, Nora took the time to cut open the cocooned hostages. She had to do it because the only melee weapons the bears carried were entrenching tools, and Amy had an axe. Turns out that carrying a knife around was useful for more than protecting yourself from gangbangers in the dark alleys. Who knew?

  As soon as the smaller cocoons were opened up, the bears trapped inside immediately jumped out and reconnected to the command network. Even though the Model Four-S’s had extremely weak ECM capabilities, the combined effect of having hundreds of overlapping tendrils created a shield that cut off all communication between the victim and the outside world. The effect wasn’t strong enough to shut down my bears, but it was enough to cut off my connection to them. Something I didn’t know was possible.

  When Nora finally got around to slicing open the large cocoon, a familiar figure rolled out.

  “Yo, Saber, you okay?” I asked hesitantly when he didn’t move. His azure armor, which looked halfway between practical and something you’d see on a kid’s action show, was completely coated in slime, so I was hesitant to touch him.

  “Deadbeat, please Silent Saber over. Carefully,” I ordered the sickly green bear.

  “He’s not dead, is he?” Amy asked hesitantly.

  “No idea, I hope not,” I grumbled. “Anyone have a medical scanner by any chance?”

  As soon as Deadbeat flipped Saber over, the bear dug into the small medical kit on its back and immediately passed a small box resembling a flip phone over to me.

  “Right… medical bears. I forgot about that,” I mumbled as I accepted the device.

  “You forgot that you equipped an entire subset of your forces with medical kits? How?” Amy asked incredulously.

  “I only really started rolling them out during the war between Denver and Calgary, when there was fighting within the city and a high chance of civilian casualties,” I explained tensely. “They really didn’t get a chance to shine there, and my bears haven’t really seen action in the last six months… so give me a break!”

  Using the scanner proved to be far trickier than I expected. It was a robust model in a lot of ways, but designed with bears in mind. The scanning surface was underneath and took readings from the closest biological, so I couldn’t cradle it like the bears could, and the display was tiny. In the end it took a few minutes, but I finally managed to ascertain Saber’s condition.

  “He’s alive… barely,” I finally declared.

  “What do you mean ‘barely’?” Nora demanded. “What’s wrong with him?”

  “If I’m reading this thing right, and I’m not one hundred percent confident I am, the paralytic managed to seep into his suit and has flooded his system. His breathing is slow, and his heartbeat is faint, but they’re there.”

  “So… what? Give him an adrenaline shot? That shouldn’t be that hard,” Amy suggested as she reached down to grab Silent’s arm.

  This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

  Nora’s hand shot out and grabbed her before I could.

  “He should be in full environmental gear,” Nora hissed. “Most of us invest in some sort of protection so we can’t be gassed easily, but somehow Silent was still paralyzed. Best to avoid touching him until we clean that shit off.”

  “And how do you plan to do that without touching him?” Amy hissed. “His condition is probably worsening every second.”

  “Normally I’d have Bob carry him back to the Kodiak and use the emergency shower there, but desperate times call for desperate measures,” I muttered. “Nyx! One emergency decontamination shower setup! Bob, please dangle Silent inside until most of this shit is off his armor.”

  “You got it, boss!” the big bear declared as he hoisted the limp samurai by the scruff of his neck.

  Amy stared at me for several seconds. “You bought a catalog for emergency showers?”

  “You’d be surprised how often they’re useful when fighting the weeds,” I grumbled. “I even opened a catalog for non-harmful solvents to help get the various fluids I’m regularly covered in off.”

  The girl continued to stare, so Nora stepped in. “Look, I know it sounds crazy, but once you get into a couple major brawls, you’ll understand. Nothing’s worse than marching around for several hours in armor that’s gummed up by antithesis guts. I know.”

  “Gross…” the girl moaned.

  While Amy was undergoing her education on the usefulness of emergency showers, I watched Bob clean off Silent. He wasn’t exactly gentle--if I’d wanted gentle, I would have asked literally anyone else--but he was effective.

  Bob only needed a single arm to hold Silent under the moderate pressure nozzles as they stripped the goo from him. Occasionally he’d turn or shake the man to loosen more of the residue, causing Silent’s head and limbs to flop around. He was quick, and efficient.

  Once the wash was done, Bob carefully laid Silent back on the cavern floor.

  “Nyx, I don’t suppose there’s a counter to the paralytic in the Medical Utilities catalog, is there?”

  “Of course, several. It just depends how quick you want it to act and what side effects you’re willing to deal with,” one of the nearby bears replied.

  “I don’t want him to go into shock, or his heart to stop, or anything like that,” I grumbled.

  “In that case, we’ll avoid the stronger stimulants. The safest way to rouse him would be a combination of neutralizer, which will encapsulate the chemical in his bloodstream until it can be removed, and something to stabilize his system,” Nyx reported. “Thirty Five for the encapsulant, Fifteen for the stabilizer.”

  “Fine, just give it to me. I’m not going to argue over fifty points when Saber’s life is on the line,” I grumbled.

  “Ummm… problem,” Amy declared as I gathered up the serums. “His armor won’t come off.”

  “Of course not, environmental seals, remember? If anyone could just pull your armor off, it wouldn’t offer much protection, would it?” I said.

  “It didn’t really do him much good,” Amy grumbled under her breath. She probably thought no one would be able to hear her, but in a small, quiet area, voices carry.

  “Ask your AI to contact Silent’s, and request them to disengage the locks,” I suggested.

  Amy was quiet for a minute, which only reminded me that most samurai subvocalized to talk to their AIs and didn’t go around having full-blown conversations with them.

  When she was done, the girl grabbed Saber’s armor at the wrist and gave it a quick turn. The glove came right off.

  “Perfect,” I whispered as I plunged the auto injectors directly into the man’s wrist.

  The effect was immediate. At first I thought he might be having a seizure, considering how his body flopped around, until I realized it was probably the encapsulator taking different amounts of time to gather the toxin out of different parts of his body.

  It took about thirty seconds for the seemingly random contractions to stop and Saber to sit up.

  “That’s an experience I never want to repeat,” he said, his words slightly slurred. “I appreciate y’all’s help. I don’t think I would have lasted much longer in that blasted weed’s grip.”

  Nora crouched down in front of him. “Are you okay? What happened? Was it just the Four-Ss?”

  “Yup, as embarrassing as it is for me to admit. The beasties came right out of the wall and wrapped me up like a christmas gift before I managed to strike em all down. I might have been able to manage if they only came from one side of the tunnel, but since they hit me from both sides at once…”

  “You did better than my bears,” I grumbled. “Those buggers managed to wrap up three of my bots and disappear before they could even react.”

  Saber chuckled slightly before breaking out into a hacking cough. “Sorry, lungs have a tickle. Probably a little of that juice left in my system.”

  “You can clear it out yourself, now that you’re up and about,” I said. “Your AI can probably analyse your condition better than my scanner can.”

  He nodded and slowly leveraged himself to a kneeling position before climbing to his feet. “Appreciate the help,” Saber mumbled.

  “Anytime. I’d like to think you’d do the same for any of us,” Nora replied quietly.

  I paused a second, trying to figure out the best way to broach the next topic before just deciding the best way was to be direct. “You wouldn’t happen to have been in contact with the other two samurai that were out here, would you? Psychosis and Trench Stormer?”

  Saber’s head snapped in my direction. “Only enough to know they were going to deal with a couple of the other hives in the area, don’t tell me…”

  “You all went off the grid about the same time,” I confirmed. “One, unlucky; two, suspicious; but three samurai going dark at the same time but in different places? I think something’s trying to fuck with us.”

  “Well then, what are we standing around here for? We’ve got some investigating to do,” Saber declared as he stumbled towards the nearest tunnel. Nora grabbed the staggering man before he got too far.

  “It’s actually this way,” she said simply.

  “Right,” Saber chuckled, “Lead the way.”

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