TBoB - Book 3 - Chapter 28 - Oceans of Antithesis

Little shorter today, was trying to pad it out... but wasn't quite working. Have to think more

I’d never seen the Marsupial deploy bears before, and I had to say, it was certainly impressive. Ten massive metal boxes slammed directly into the middle of the antithesis lines. As soon as they hit the sides opened up and a full squad of bears poured out of each.

I did see a couple bears get pulled down by the antithesis horde before they gained control of the situation, but not many. I didn’t like to see it happen. Bob literally just jumped directly from the ship into the middle of the horde, quickly filling the area around him with a small mountain of corpses.

“Nyx, additional note. If the marsupial is going to drop bears directly into combat like that I’m going to need to invest in more assault bears. Either to jump from the ship first, or be the first ones out of the pods,” I said as the Grizzly slowly made its way up to the battleline.

“Why did you wait so long to do that anyways?” Hoppy asked. “Bob is a fucking beast. I’d think you’d want more of him”

“Well… I’ve always thought of him as one of a kind, and hesitated getting more of him,” I admitted, “but the bigger issue is the cost. The blueprint will set me back more than twenty thousand.”

Hoppy whistled. “Quite the investment.”

I nodded slightly. “The last time I had that amount was deep in the caverns, and I was more concerned with dealing with the immediate situation than planning for the future. Although I don’t regret it, being able to buy all those bears probably saved our lives at the time, I do wish I’d had a little bit more to invest after we’d finished”

“Well, there are plenty of antithesis to clean up here. You may still get a chance,” Hoppy replied before turning back towards the fight.

Even though I didn’t show it, my brain was going a mile a minute. I was busy getting the bears into a battleline, and setting up a slow advance, while also redirecting a small squad to keep an eye on Arclight. It was much easier now, but it still required a bit of concentration to do. 

Once everything was set, the bears pushed. The moose that were armed with the rotary lasers took the lead, cutting deep into the antithesis lines, followed by the smaller bears. When the larger antithesis models showed up the moose with coilguns easily dispatched them. Our advance went from slow, to smooth.

“What about the corpses?” Hoppy asked after about a minute. 

I blinked. I’d been far too focused on the fight and hadn’t noticed the number of antithesis we’d been leaving behind. The street was absolutely littered with them. “Fuck,” I grumbled. “I guess I get my squad to perform the cleanup. Unless you have a better idea.”

“I’m honestly surprised you don’t have a bot dedicated to eliminating the corpses already,” she replied as she darted into the battleline to kick a Six that had gotten much too close.

I stared at her for several seconds. “Nyx,” I said dumbfoundedly. “I have another note for you.”

—

After the marsupial joined in, providing aerial fire support and a whole lot of bears, we made good progress towards our next target. I’d expected the horde to thin out after a block or so, but the antithesis kept pushing back at us. 

“Shouldn’t they be running out of bodies?” grumbled as I fired indiscriminately into the masses filling the street. “Where are they all coming from?”

“I hate to tell you this boss, but I think the critters are pouring down the side streets too. They’ll be flanking us pretty soon,” Bandit reported. 

“Of course they fucking are,” I growled. “I’ll reroute a couple of squads to watch our backs.” 

As the bears rearranged themselves, I scowled. The other two pods had been easy to collapse, why were there so many more antithesis in this area? 

With a single thought I sent the marsupial ahead. Its PAWs had been doing work killing the aerial models, but I wanted to see what we were dealing with.

The aircraft shifted, gently gliding over some smaller buildings and around a couple megabuildings, before it finally caught sight of the impact site. Unlike the last locations this place didn’t have a single long spar, but a dozen of the things surrounding a monolithic tree. It seemed like most of the antithesis had already left the area, leaving just a cleanup crew. That would explain why we were encountering hundreds pouring down the street.

As I watched a legion of Eights ate through the remains of the outer shell, then headed to the central area to vomit it up on the tree. I zoomed in and focused on the base. There were half a dozen shapes hanging just off the ground, ones I hadn’t seen in quite awhile. The triple bodied model Thirteens, hive defenders.

I narrowed my eyes. “Is that thing an active hive?” I whispered.

Not quite. A true hive needs digestion and birthing chambers, along with a number of support structures. It would never survive the trip in a seedpod. The seedpod core is designed as an ideal hive starter though. It has Legions to protect it, and extra mass from the outer shell to jumpstart the transformation. It can become a fully functioning hive in just an hour or two.

“Fuck that,” I muttered. With a single unspoken command the marsupial began to bombard the structure with its coilguns. It wasn’t exactly the most efficient way to destroy the structure, but it was still effective. The smaller spars exploded after a single shot, while the central tree took several volleys. I felt a particular satisfaction as the Thirteens exploded without even getting a chance to disconnect from the central tree. Once I’d set the attack in motion I disconnected from the marsupial.

It took me a second to get a sense of what was going on at street level. The battle hadn’t stalled, but it wasn’t going well either. Just like Bandit said, a huge wave of antithesis had flooded into the street behind us, forcing us to fight on two fronts. The bears were cutting them down just as fast as they appeared, causing the antithesis bodies to pile up in the streets. Despite the huge number of antithesis I didn’t feel all that worried about the siutation.

“You know,” I said as I wandered towards Hoppy. “The antithesis feel a lot less threatening when there’s no twenties rampaging about.”

She snorted and stepped back from the line. “Yeah, well, I think we both have a skewed idea of what’s dangerous after fighting through those caverned. Most samurai will NEVER face what we saw in the caverns. The antithesis models that can land during an incursion are extremely limited, and twenties are rare outside of established hives… there’s a reason why veteran samurai usually leave the clearing of an incursion to their newest members. There’s no challenge, and the younger ones can use the experience.” 

“You know we’re both some of the newest samurai in the city,” I reminded her. 

“Yeah, but I’d definitely say we’re experienced,” Hoppy shot back. “I don’t think it really matters right now, we need to thin out the antithesis numbers, and there’s enough for everyone to get some points,” Hoppy pointed out. 

A warning went off in my head, the antithesis had finally hit the parameter. There were only a small number for now, hopefully we’d prevent a major horde from getting that far. “They’re starting to spread out, hit the parameter. This lot came from a full pod, which explains the numbers, but we should be able to chew through them in another couple minutes.” 

“Then let's get clearing!” Hoppy exclaimed as she jumped back into the action. 

I shook my head, raised my rifle, and aimed it at the horde. The day was still young, and we still had work to do.