Even after the bears and I took care of the ambush, the sound of gunfire echoed through the tunnel system. I took off back towards the connecting tunnel, my instincts to protect my friends activating before my brain did.

  I was a couple of meters away from the bears when my good sense finally kicked in, and I ordered them to follow me.

  The smart move would have been to slow down and wait for my forces to catch up, but a part of me was worried that if the others ran into an ambush like that, they might get overrun. I made it all the way back to the previous intersection before Bob caught up.

  His facade was still burnt, armor was still smoldering, but other than that he seemed perfectly fine. Although he normally trundled about, he was capable of some serious speed when he wanted to, due to his long legs. At least in a straight line.

  “I’ll go ahead!” he exclaimed as he bounced off the corner of the connection tunnel before righting himself and taking off again.

  “Don’t wait for me!” I shouted after him.

  I managed to make it halfway down the tunnel before the sound of gunfire started to peter off. There was no way for me to tell if that was a good thing or a bad thing, so I just put my head down and ran faster.

  Skidding around the corner, I brought up my rifle, expecting the worst.

  The corridor was absolutely filled with bodies. It wasn’t just the small models either, there were a handful of Twenty-Threes and even a couple Twenty-Eights scattered about. And at the far end of the tunnel…

  “Hey Evelyn, what’s the hurry?” Nora asked as she casually wiped the accumulated Antithesis blood and brain matter off her legs.

  “There was an ambush, and I heard gunfire,” I explained blankly as I stared at my friends.

  “Please, it would take a whole lot more than this to take us out,” Charlotte chuckled. “You honestly didn’t think we’d be overrun by this lot, did you? Why didn’t you just call to check if we were okay?”

  “Because there was the sound of fighting. I didn’t want to interrupt you in the middle of battle and possibly make things worse,” I admitted.

  “So you didn’t think we could handle what they threw against us?” Amy pouted.

  “Well, I was ambushed by a pair of dragons and a pack of Twenty-Threes, so I was a little worried,” I admitted. “Plus it felt like the instant that I figured out we were moving down parallel tunnels the Antithesis attacked, like they were trying to keep us separated for some reason.”

  “We were running down parallel tunnels?” Amy asked, surprised.

  “Apparently. I was only about a hundred meters to the west and didn’t even notice until Nyx fixed the map for us,” I muttered.

  “It could have been a coincidence,” Angeline suggested.

  “I can see us being pulled in the same direction, we are trying to find the hive after all,” I conceded. “But I find the fact that we were lured down parallel paths, and the Antithesis were interrupting all the squirrels that went down the paths that connected us pretty suspicious.”

  “True… that does sound suspicious, but we haven’t run into any Model Seventeens down here. There’s no way the Antithesis should be that organized,” Nora exclaimed.

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  “And yet, they managed to make a coordinated strike against both of our groups,” I replied. “Just when I was planning on doubling back and meeting up with you all.”

  Charlotte and Angeline exchanged a quick glance.

  “Probably just a coincidence,” Nora insisted.

  “Even if it was, I’d feel better if we traveled in a group from now on,” I muttered.

  “That’s fine, strength in numbers after all,” Angeline chuckled nervously.

  While the others gathered themselves, I glanced around the area. “Where’s Bob? He should have arrived before me,” I asked.

  “He volunteered to help clean up,” Nora replied casually.

  “How? He doesn’t carry any flesh melters on him?”

  Nora simply pointed down the tunnel behind them. Bob was busy piling up the bodies of the Twenty-Threes into a neat pile. As soon as he saw me, he waved and gave me a dopey smile.

  “Typical,” I muttered.

  It took another minute or so for the rest of my forces to show up, despite them all running at full speed. I’d forgotten how slow they could be without the transports, especially Heavy and the Moose. I made a note to investigate ways to boost their base stats later, if I could.

  While the troops reformed the battle lines, I pulled Bandit over to a meeting with the other Samurai.

  “You were tracking the Antithesis by their pheromone trails back in the previous tunnel. What do you smell here?” I asked.

  The fox tilted his head to the side. “Smells the same, honestly, like the Antithesis were coming out of the side tunnels and heading straight ahead.”

  “And none of them were going back?” Amy asked.

  “I can’t tell that,” Bandit admitted. “All I can tell is that the Antithesis’ scent trails get more dense further ahead.”

  “And it was exactly the same in the other tunnel? Is that normal?” Angeline asked.

  “Usually the smells are everywhere, on every possible surface, and it only gets thicker the closer to the hive we get,” Bandit explained.

  “And that’s not the case here?” I asked suspiciously.

  “The pheromones aren’t as thick in these tunnels as I’d expect… but there is a consistent increase the further we go.”

  “The Antithesis can’t just stop producing pheromones, right? Is that something they can do?” Amy asked excitedly.

  “I have no idea,” Charlotte admitted. “I think the smaller models practically rely upon the pheromone trails to navigate back to the hive, like ants or other colony-based insects. I guess they could theoretically do without it if they had another way to navigate.”

  “Nyx, you or any of the other AIs want to chip in, let us know what the fuck is going on?” I grumbled.

  [I’m broadcasting to everyone, with their AI’s permission.] Nyx’s reply flashed across my augs. [Early Antithesis infestations do indeed rely upon pheromones to direct the lower-level models, but these methods are typically abandoned once the Antithesis develop a reliable command network.]

  “So once they have a couple Seventeens running around, they’ll stop relying on pheromones,” I grumbled.

  [Possibly, but it usually doesn’t happen until something stronger is around,] my AI replied.

  “Stronger how?” I asked, narrowing my eyes.

  [Typically just a stronger model, something capable of controlling far more Antithesis in a far more organized fashion.]

  “Wonderful, super Seventeen,” I muttered.

  “But… Why would the Antithesis get rid of the pheromones, even if they did have that level of control? Wouldn’t it be smarter to have a backup?”

  [It’s because by removing the pheromone glands, the Antithesis can produce any of the base models with one percent less biomass.]

  “That really doesn’t seem like a big improvement,” Amy frowned.

  [The Antithesis rely upon numbers. One percent could result in hundreds of thousands, or even millions of extra units over the course of an invasion,] Nyx reminded her.

  “So it’s possible that something could be trying to lead us around using fake trails?” Angeline asked.

  [Absolutely.]

  “Then what do we do now?” Angeline muttered. “If we can’t rely upon either the pheromones or my scouts, what are we supposed to do?”

  “We’ll just have to find another way,” Nora exclaimed.

  Charlotte started and stood up a little bit straighter. “The pressure wave. Are there any Antithesis that control using pressure, or… whatever that was that hit us back there?”

  [Not pressure… but if a hive that is birthing Seventeen grows to a sufficient size, one of the Seventeen may cocoon itself and evolve into a Thirty-Seven-E. The Thirty-Seven-E has a similar purpose to the Seventeen but is significantly smarter, and it controls the local Antithesis through ultrasonic waves.]

  “And we can track that sound!” Angeline exclaimed. “I bet my squirrels are even sensitive enough to track something like that. I just have to get them to look for it.”

  She cocked her head to the side slightly, then winced. “There’s a lot of noise and feedback in the area. And I mean a LOT. I think I can use my current scouts to triangulate, though.”

  “Which way?” Charlotte asked.

  “West. Straight west,” Angeline replied, with a nod.

  “Then west we go,” I muttered. “Let’s go kill a brain.”

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