Hive-Clearing is so much easier with multiple Sams.

  Not because of the exponential increase in options you get when working with each other.

  But because it makes the quiet moments multiple times more bearable.

  -Shadowtag, 2049

  The rest of dinner went fairly smoothly, minus the running commentary of Cryo about just how cute I was. I refuse to admit that the reason I was blushing so hard wasn’t the spiciness of the chili.

  “So Spark,” Inque prompted, “besides that wild shotgun, what else do you have?”

  Fighting down the raging blush from Cryo I replied, “Besides this, I have an electrical hand cannon, a rifle,” The memory of that place sent shivers up my spine, “and I left behind a C-Foam launcher at the wreckage of my family’s farm equipment.”

  “C-Foam?” Inque tilted xeir head, “Like cummie grenades?”

  I gaped at xem, “What?!”

  Xey waved me off, “It’s from an old game that I like playing, the short version of it though is that its a reinforcement and/or gluing tool.”

  “Uhhhhhhh, I guess? They sound very similar. It’s what I use it for anyways.”

  [If I may.] Pyri spoke through my helmet speakers, [The equipment Spark is referring to was named after the video game weapon you are referring to Vanguard InqueAbyss.]

  “They’re sometimes called that for, uhhhhh, obvious reasons.” Inque explained, “Us gamers tend to, uhhhh, conflate off-white things with that a lot.”

  “I can’t tell what’s worse, the entire idea of calling it cummies, or your use of the word ‘gamer’ there,” I replied.

  Inque could only giggle in response.

  “Moving on,” Sky prompted, “How do you like the chili Spark?”

  Barely stopping myself from begging for more, I thought for a moment before responding.

  “I am legitimately considering joining up just for more chili. Also ‘cause one of my cousins would cry tears of joy if he got to taste it.”

  Sky flushed slightly, “I would be happy to make food for your family, if that’s okay with you. Especially considering the uhhhh… state of your home.”

  I saw real discomfort in the grimace she gained. “Sorry, that sounds incredibly insensitive, and you could probably just buy a new house. But if need be, you all can stay with us while your place is fixed up.”

  I thought for a few moments about continuing to live out here, Pyri’s estimate for the Vulgoran half of my transition’s duration would be much longer than the first one, not to mention the destruction that would need to be repaired first.

  And… I needed somewhere to leave her.

  I shuddered, “I might take you up on that offer. My aunt doesn’t like Sams one bit, and well… she attacked me.”

  “Oh Spark,” Sky replied, “That’s horrible.”

  I waved off the three looks of concern being sent my way.

  “I’ll be fine, I’ll have to talk to Evie about this when we get back.”

  Cryo picked that moment to jump in, “Well if you need someone to rough up your aunt, I’ll gladly give her a piece of my mind.”

  I opened my mouth to respond only for the Biotracker to interrupt me with a pinging sound.

  “Figured it’d been too quiet for a while,” Cryo said with a grin. “I’ll deal with them!”

  She all but sprinted towards the tunnels with her gun brought forward.

  “Come on, we’re all done anyway,” Sky said while standing up and stretching. She offered a hand to help me up, “Might as well get moving.”

  Accepting the offered hand, I was pulled to my feet.

  “Thanks.” I said, with a load of heat coming back to my face.

  “Don’t mention it, get your helmet on though, before Cryo decides to blind us all.”

  Slipping my helmet back on felt like walls that were both comfortable, yet restricting coming up around me.

  ‘Pyri, next helmet I buy, I want the face plate to be transparent.’

  Understood, You can also swap the face shield out later if you would like to keep everything but that.

  I smiled, ‘Yeah that sounds perfect.’

  “Eye protection is on!” Inque shouted at Cryo off in the distance.

  “Finally! It’s time to cut loose!” Cryo excitedly cheered.

  That telltale plume of blue fire shot down the right-side tunnel, no doubt creating more deceased effigies of the defending antithesis.

  This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  “C’mon Sky!” Cryo shouted about the hissing of her frost-thrower, “Might as well push into the tunnels now!”

  Sky turned to both of us, “Be careful, both of you. No excessive risk taking.”

  Inque snapped to what had to be the sloppiest salute I’d ever seen. Ignoring xem, Sky turned around, and rushed after her distant teammate.

  “Come on Spark, can’t let those two have all the fun.” Inque drawled, “In fact why don’t you show off that rifle you were talking about?”

  I pulled out the Fox-Trill, “It’s suited to single target stuff, so I take the larger targets while you get the chaff?”

  Xey tilted xeir head, “Yeah that’ll work, also nice word for the small stuff. It’s nice.”

  “Thanks!” I swept my arm towards the left tunnel, “Shall we?”

  “We shall.”

  With that said, we both entered the tunnel.

  ***

  Meanwhile in the Right-side Tunnel:

  “You seem to really like her Azure,” Cryo mentioned offhandedly, “You do know I was joking about sucking her off earlier right?”

  Sky looked back at her teammate with exasperation, “Alaanah! I swear-“

  “Azure, the way you look at her says more than enough-” Cryo paused to hose down another group of Threes with ice while Sky peppered far off Models with incendiary crossbow bolts. “-don’t forget that you were the most oblivious of us way back when.”

  Sky hmph’d, “Well how about you then? You were the one who decided to try and make her melt down during dinner!”

  “One; she’s trans and most likely freshly transitioned. Complimenting her shows support or some sort of psychological BS. Two; have you seen her? Everything I said back there was true!”

  Cryo stopped to look her teammate in the eye, “You will need to come clean if she decides to join up. We all will honestly.”

  “I know Alaanah,” Sky nervously replied, “I just, ugh”

  “Fair. Also I’ve been meaning to ask, why did we rush so much to get out here?” Sky turned to glare at her, and Cryo put her hands up as she added, “Not saying that our response time isn’t important! But you were flooring it even more than normal.”

  SkyFire only shrugged, “Shadowtag had the property marked for immediate response. No idea why.”

  “Surprised she didn’t get out here before us then.” Cryo muttered.

  “She’s out on emergency in the gulf,” Sky replied, “investigating the New Houston wreckage I think.”

  Cryo scowled, “When she gets back, I’m demanding she take a damned break. She’s always out and about, and it’s about damn time the Family force her on vacation.”

  “That’s another reason I want Spark to at least join the local Family branch,” Sky put a bolt between the eyes of a Model Six killing it instantly. “It would ensure Shadowtag wouldn’t go out on Family assignments until Spark is trained, at least.”

  ***

  Left-side Tunnel:

  “You know Pyri,” I muttered while pulling myself out of a puddle of goo I had fallen into, “Are these boots actually sink-proof or not?”

  They are, you’re just clumsy.

  I pouted at her while sighting one of the Model Fives that caused me to run through one of Inque’s puddles without keeping an eye on my footing. A trigger pull caused a flash of lightning in tandem with the whirring of the Trill to dance across my sight and hearing.

  “Inque! How’re you holding up?” I shouted.

  “I’m fine! Still purging the neurotoxin from those Fives, but I’ll manage!” Inque responded with a grunt.

  While clearing out the flood of Threes that had rushed to meet us, we had ran into a squadron of Fives, resulting in my slipping, and filling Inque with needles and neurotoxin that knocked xem out of the fight.

  “Well you might as well stay down until I get rid of these rose bushes!” I shouted over the cacophony of needles plinking off the walls, and lightning snaking through the air to deliver electricity to the Five’s nervous systems.

  “I’m not going anywhere,” xey grunted, “Don’t worry!”

  Each ursoid creature collapsed one by one until one final bolt put an end to the threat.

  “They’re down!” I shouted, “Give ‘em hell!”

  “Gladly!”

  The tunnel was filled with a whirlwind of thin oily black tentacles whipping out and dismembering the swarm in seconds.

  Also it left more of that goop everywhere.

  I carefully picked my way over to Inque’s heavily breathing form as xey pulled xeir mass back together.

  “How is it that their neurotoxins even affect you anyway?” I asked after waiting for xem to reform completely. It was honestly kinda looking, like playing with sentient waterlogged mud.

  “Ugh, I’ve been trying to iron that weakness out ever since I first transitioned.” xey responded while working kinks out of xeir joints. “It’s just stupidly strong. I can handle a few needles just fine, but a full squad’s volley? The payload in that is enough to put down a Tier Four Sam.”

  “That’s… horrifying to know.”

  “Welp, it’s something you need to know about in our line of work. Kudos to your armor choice by the way!” Xey clapped me on the shoulder, “That stuff’ll stop the quills no problem!”

  “I would hope so,” I muttered, “I got the armor plating after getting caught out in a building with a horde of the porcupine fucks chasing after me.”

  Xeir wince told me all I needed to know about xeir thoughts on that.

  “I know it doesn’t mean much,” xey paused to choose xeir words, “especially considering how awful our response time was, but I am so incredibly sorry you had to deal with all of that alone.”

  The sound of several sets of claws clicking across the ground echoed from down the tunnel.Inque took a few extra steps forward while twisting xeir arms into a blade and whip, leaving me a clean firing line.I shrugged as I raised my weapon.

  “It’s- I mean it’s not fine, but I imagine you would’ve shown up as fast as possible if you got an alert from the start? Also, y’all are decently cool I guess.” I said with a chuckle.

  “Only decently?” Xey responded with mock outrage, “I’ll have you know that we are so cool we’re subzero!”

  The mixed horde of antithesis rounded the corner, the leading Model Four instantly taking a lightning bolt to the face.

  “Cryo’s weaponry doesn’t count.” I fired back.

  A few extra tentacles with blades on the ends emerged from Inque’s back. “Then I guess I’ll have to prove just how cool we are then!”

  We fell into silence as we got to work. Inque charging forward, blades whipping here and there. A pair of xeir tentacles embedding themselves in the ceiling with ease, leaving xem hanging, and allowing xeir lower back tentacles even more space to work with. I focused on the intentional gap xey left me, firing past to tag any Five or Six before a quill was flung, or an order given.

  “We have to be closing in on the main structure if they’re this agitated!” Inque called back, “Looks like we got the fun part of the mission!”

  “How do you figure that?” I shouted.

  “Well for one thing, I doubt the antithesis would have two tunnels linking the two exact same rooms! Not without an incredibly annoying maze to get through anyhow!” Xey paused for a moment to start pushing forward, a third tentacle assisting with the motion.

  “Point is, we’d have gotten a call from Sky if the other two had found something big! Which means we got the main hive, and those two are most likely heading towards the rest of the satellite nodes!”

  I grin as xeir words clicked. “And that means we get to fight the big ugly fuckers!”