TBoB - Book 3 - Chapter 27 - A tangled web

Might rewrite a little of the TH chapter. Have Reina cut the legs off with the extended blade, then run out of power when trying to finish it. Seems better that way.

When Hoppy, the bears and I finished clearing the building, I found Arclight still standing where we’d left him, apparently still watching the broadcast.

“We’re supposed to be killing antithesis you know,” I said as I walked past him. The Grizzly had returned several minutes ago, and was just waiting for us outside the window.

“Did you really just destroy one of our super heavy tanks? Do you know how much one of those costs?” he asked.

“Hey! They fired upon me and mine first! Plus, they weren’t exactly yours anymore.” I replied casually as I hopped over to the Grizzly. “Weren’t you watching the broadcast?”

“Yeah, I watched it. I don’t know how that makes a difference,” he replied, carefully stepping on the lowered ramp and heading towards the hatch so he could make his way up top safely.

I sat heavily on one of the thicker armor plates. “I really hope the corps got the message, and understood it better than you did. I’d hate to have to do this AGAIN,” I said with a sigh. “Let me explain it.”

“Helmar is part of the Calgary board. They were apparently contacted by Applied System Dynamics, and the Denver alliance a couple weeks ago and offered a deal,” I said. “If they stayed out of the conflict not only could they keep all their assets, but they could get rewarded after the takeover.”

“So that’s why they accused Telnet of being traitors, and withdrew their troops a couple days ago?” Hoppy asked as she dropped down next to me.

“Exactly so,” I replied with a nod. “Unfortunately, Helmar wasn’t content with minor gains, they wanted a major expansion, so they came up with a plan. Aggravate the conflict by making it look like the ASD troops were trying to cause an antithesis outbreak, so the locals would press the attack. After both sides wore each other down Helmar could step in and ‘renegotiate’ from a position of strength.

As the Grizzly began its slow descent back to street level Arclight finally poked his head out of the hatch. “How the fuck do you even know this?”

“Nyx hacked the military comms. When we found out the order came from an unexpected source they hacked the tank crew’s bank accounts, followed the payment back to Helmar, then scoured their network for a reason,” I explained. 

“It’s all quite simple, with the right catalogs,” Deadbeat said.

“You did all that within a few minutes?” Arclight asked. He hadn’t left the hatch, he’d just sat there, staring.

“No, Nyx had that info within seconds,” I told him. “I had to make a few calls to let the others know, decide on a penalty, and carry that out. It takes a few minutes to organize all those private military companies. People aren’t as efficient as AIs unfortunately.”

“Soo… what happens now?” Arclight asked blankly.

“We exterminate antithesis,” I replied. “With the additional bodies around the perimeter we shouldn’t have to worry about anything getting out…”

“I meant about Helmar,” Arclight snapped. 

“Who the fuck cares?” I backed back. “Hel suggested we redirect their PMCs so we had more time to deal with the incursion, but at the end of the day it’s STILL not my fucking problem. Yes, we did make it easier for the other corps to go and have words with them, but it’s up to them whether they want to carry through or not. Helmar fucked with me, and the antithesis defenses, so I fucked with them back. I’m a vindictive asshole, that’s it.”

Arclight was quiet for a minute. He climbed out of the hatch and sat on a slab a couple feet away. “I don’t get it. We samurai have all this power, why not use it to make things better?” 

“How? By supporting a fucking corp? Participating in a war?” I snorted. “I’m from the undercity and as far as I’m concerned the corps have never done shit. I’m making my area a better place, slowly, but as far as I’m concerned the corps are all the same. I don’t give a shit who’s in charge.”

The Grizzly touched down, and immediately started down the street, directed by Bandit’s silent command.

“What about you, Hoppy? Don’t you want to make this a better place?,” Arclight finally asked.

“Leave me the fuck out of this!” Hoppy declared. “Prior to becoming a samurai I worked in a dojo. The only interaction I had with the corps was when I bought one of their overpriced products. Becoming a samurai has made me a lot stronger, and given me access to advantages I couldn’t have dreamed of before, but that doesn’t mean I’ve suddenly become more interested in city politics, or the corps. As long as the city doesn’t collapse, I’m happy.”

“You’re both terrible! You should care about the state of the city you live in!” Arclight grumbled.

“Caring about the city, and caring about which asshole is in charge are two totally different things,” I said. “If you believe you’re doing the right thing, good for you! You’re probably maybe making a difference, but please, stop trying to push your beliefs onto us. I get enough of that from the assholes you were skirmishing with earlier.”

Arclight’s mouth flapped open and closed for a minute, like a fish, before he finally turned away. “Fine.”

“Thank you,” I said gratefully that the discussion was finally over. “Now let’s work on getting this incursion cleared up.”

He just grunted in response.

—

We managed to clear the next pod area fairly quickly, but as we approached the central areas the antithesis resistance massively increased. Elevens led entire swarms of Ones into attack runs, nearly overwhelming the PAWs system, while Twelves and Fourteens led waves of antithesis at street level. Our progress slowed to a crawl.

“Where are all these fuckers coming from?” I grumbled. 

“Haven’t seen this many antithesis since we were back down in the tunnels,” Hoppy replied with a giggle. “Maybe an entire pod made it down?”

“Maybe,” I admitted as I shot a Six in the face. The Grizzly was moving so slowly that I jumped down and started walking beside it. My butt had been getting sore from sitting on those hard armor plates anyways. “We’ll make more progress when the Marsupial arrives. Between Bob and the additional guns we should be able to make some serious progress.”

“What’s taking big boy so long anyways?” Hoppy asked.

“I ordered the bears to literally tear that superheavy apart, which they took literally, and Bob was trying to figure out if he could mount that cannon on his back. I didn’t even know until I checked in on him,” I grumbled.

“I didn’t think Bob was smart enough to reverse engineer something like that,” Hoppy said.

“He’s NOT,” I snarled. “He was literally trying to figure out a way to tie the entire thing to his back. I love him, but he’s no genius.”

Hoppy just laughed. “It’s a good thing you have Spooky to do the heavy mental lifting then.”

Behind me Arclight cleared his throat. “I think I might split off from you here, try and clear up another street.”

“Tired of hearing our casual disregard of the war?” Hoppy asked.

“Actually, I think I need a little time to think about things,” Arclight said. “I admit, I don’t agree with your stance, but what really has me confused is Teddy. The things she says, and does, with almost casual indifference is maddening. She ordered the destruction of a superheavy tank like it was the simplest thing in the world, and five minutes later it was done. Who does that?”

“She does things like that a lot,” Hoppy replied, dead serious. “You just kind of learn to take it in stride, and not piss her off.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” he mumbled. “I’ll try and contact my friends, update them on the situation, and maybe catch up with one of them. Thanks for letting me tag along, it’s been… different.”

“Take care of yourself,” I replied with a nod. 

As Arc took off down the sidestreet, Hoppy smacked me on the arm. “You sure we should just let him go like that? We should stick together!”

“He said he wanted some time to think, who am I to argue?” I replied. Hoppy just gave me an angry stare, so after a few seconds I sighed. “I’ll send a couple bears to keep an eye on him when the marsupial gets here. Just in case. Happy?” 

“Don’t pretend you weren’t going to do that anyways,” Hoppy scoffed. No matter how grumpy you act, you care about the people you meet.”

“Just don’t go telling everyone,” I huffed as the Marsupial finally arrived, shadowing the entire street. “Let's get this show on the road, we have antithesis to kill.”