As Kaylee stepped into view of the tunnel, she had the joy of watching one of the eggs hatch. The egg layers had by now dispersed back into the tunnel, leaving Kaylee to watch in numb fascination as the dark shell cracked open, slowly peeling apart as the viscous agents inside slowly lost their fight against gravity and the strength of the birthing creature within. With a series of sickening cracks, the shell gave way as the creature inside pushed itself free and unfurled. As the arachnid stood up, Kaylee noticed that these specimens didn’t follow the same shape as the ones she had just instructed to bury themselves in the field. These bugs, that now numbered at 8 were noticeably bigger as well as much thinner, their thorax stretching out into a long tube, glowing a dim green. As she stepped closer, Kaylee felt an itch at the back of her mind, like a phantom memory, slowing to a stop she continued to watch as the creatures began to make a series of stretches, bending their surprisingly flexible thoraxes until they were almost level with the ground, as she watched the itching sensation grew. Kaylee closed her eyes and hissed. The last traces of the experience floated through, allowing Kaylee to ‘feel’ the behaviour of the creatures, ‘seeing’ how the bug would flex its tail to fire a blast of sizzling energy, either directly at airborne threats or indirectly at ground forces. With that knowledge, and now with the headache subsiding, Kaylee was able to turn her mind to planning for the assault. With that, Kaylee stood up and began to run back into the field. Feeling an uncharacteristic rush of excitement running through her body.
Odin rose up on its stilt legs and scanned the battlenet. So far the enemy strategy had remained unchanged, relying on wave upon wave of cheap units, smashed against the bulwark of his assault like waves crashing against a boulder. And just like the sea, these bugs continued to break against his assault. Scanning the battlenet, the cyborg watched in amusement as a final, pitiful wave of beading and broken arachnids slapped pitifully against the spearhead of his assault. Having landed several kilometers away, his dropships had disgorged waves of robots onto the field. From there they had swept through the area, annihilating anything that stood in their way.
Unsurprisingly this had kicked the hive into full panic mode, the creatures rushing up from their hidden catacombs to repel the threat, and now they were expended, their hideouts scorched and collapsed, their soldiers slaughtered. And their commander cowering in a hole somewhere. Odin laughed, a low, grinding sound.
“Fan out. Find the commander.”
As he watched the multitude icons began to disperse he sat back, letting the data from his machines flow through him.
Raising her head from the dirt, Kaylee took a quick look around the area before ducking back into the dirt. Diving into the hive mind she grabbed and took hold of one of her drones, moving as fluidly as if it were her own body, Kaylee began to scramble through the trees, swinging between the foliage as it dove deeper into no mans land, Kaylee continued to scan the environment, looking for any movement, any flash of light, anything at all. For several minutes, she failed to catch any movement, until she did. Skidding to a stop and barely catching herself from falling out of a tree. Moving down below her were a good couple dozen robots slowly moving through the grass below.
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“Shit.” She almost muttered out loud, realising she had almost chattered through the bug’s mouth. Kaylee quickly scuttled backwards and further up into the tree. As she tried her best to avoid any sudden movements, she watched in dread as another wave swept by immediately behind the first group, several more ‘squads’ advancing in 100-meter intervals to the left and the right. Disconnecting her mind from the soldier, Kaylee entered another that had perched itself on the edge of the hill overlooking the immediate area. Sure enough, in the distance she could catch fleeting flashes of baleful red in the brush. For several minutes, Kaylee waited and watched from her many eyes as the first wave of robots began to emerge from the tree line, their wheels slowly turning as they began to roll into the long grass.
“Ready” The mental command caused every arachnid under her control to tense.
“Fire” Her soldiers didn’t move; the bombardiers let rip.
She felt the explosion before she heard it, a sudden hammer blow to her stomach that drove the wind out of her even through her carapace, the force almost enough to eject her from her hiding place. Reaching into the mind of one of the bombardiers, she watched in awe as the tail swelled with glowing green power before releasing it in a crackling bolt. Flying low over where her troops were hidden, the projectile crashed into an advancing squad of bots, reducing the tinmen into sparking shrapnel. The bots of course were reacting immediately, rapidly converging on the origin point of the deadly fire, spitting deadly bolts of energy in return as they swarmed towards the cannons.
“Now” Kaylee bellowed, leaping up and raising her gun in a quick, not quite smooth motion, eyes refocusing to the light Kaylee found herself face to face with one of the robots, its red monocle burning straight into her eyes. It adjusted, she fired, it didn’t. The ripper shot tore the guts out completely, tearing the machine apart at the waist, around her about a dozen more robots skidding to a halt and began bringing their guns to bear on Kaylee, barrels glowing.
Only to swing wildly as the ground erupted around them in a shower of mud, grass and teeth. The arachnids swarmed the bots, their fangs tearing straight through the barely present armour that made up the clankers, rapidly bringing each one down before moving on. Kaylee to her credit was also in motion, cracking off precise shots on every robot that wasn’t immediately occupied with fighting off the wave of bugs. As she sighted on another bot, she felt a sudden stinging sensation in her side, closely followed by the distinct smell of burned meat. Howling, Kaylee spun around as she collapsed, unleashing a sweeping barrage in the direction of the offending party, severing its head from the body.
