I threw myself to the side to avoid the spray of bullets that erupted from the room. Heavy’s optics winked out, pletely destroyed by the initial volley of gunfire, so I switched to Spooky. All my bots were firing into the room, iively. I could see the shapes move forward, slowly, it was only when they came closer to the door that I got a good look at them.

  Eae was supported by four massive legs, what I inally thought were locker doors were in fact massive riot shields that hung from one arm, their other side held massive belt fed mae guns.

  “Those ot be standard security.”

  They’re not, those are military grade Anti-Antithesis ons. They’re off the grid, so I ’t shut them dowher.

  “Wonderful” I saw Humboldt level her on and fire off a shot. The warbot in the middle caught the shot on its shield, which dented, but was otherwise unharmed.

  I signaled for the bears to scatter, I had a feeling that they’d do little more than provide a minor distra at this point, and I called Spooky to me. As soon as it arrived I yahe railgun off its bad peeked around the mae I’d taken cover behind.

  One of the warbots started turning in my dire, so I aimed for it, ter mass, and pulled the trigger. The resulting boom was deafening. I just dropped the railgun and ordered Spooky to grab it again, it was useless to me until it cooled down.

  I scrambled into cover behind a new mae, pulling up Bandit’s point of view. The shot had caved in the shield, and caused the chest area to crumple, but it didn’t fully pee. A fug anti tank rifle. I screamed into my hands.

  Aeonys just tacted me, Humboldt wants to pull back but she’s ed your armor won't hold up to those bullets.

  “No shit, please tell me you have an idea.”

  I do, but I’m not sure yoing to like it.

  “Try me!” I shouted over the noise from the mae guns.

  Now is not the time to s to heavier armor, so the best option would be getting a bodyguard from the Css II modur bat robotics catalog. There is one perfect choice from the higher end, the XAR-4506 assault bot, pretty much a Samurai upgrade of those warbots over there.

  “And the downside?”

  It’s most of your current bawo thousand.

  “Fuckity fuck fuck,” I growled. With all the bullets ricocheting arou only took a moment for me to make up my mind. “Do it, ahe bears to retreat outside.”

  Suddenly, a giant silhouette sprung up behind me. One arm swept under my arms, lifting me up, I watched the other arm stretch out and a giant riot shield extended from the forearm. Then there was the sensation of movement, I could see the ground moving below me but the giant shield blocked my view. After a few seds the air ged, outside. I was unceremoniously deposited around the er from the door and, for the first time, I got a good look at my new helper. It was a huge, well ht feet, bck bear. This one wore something like SWAT armor, the riot shield it previously deployed folded into a sie on its forearm.

  A sed ter Humboldt and my bears came barreling around the er, Dusty ractically carrying Heavy since his repairs hadn’t pleted yet. As soon as they left the warehouse the guopped. Perhaps the warbots were programmed to protect the vault and not chase intruders. For a moment, I was just gd we got out of there alive, then I got pissed.

  “That was iional, it had to be! Those fug pnts lured us here to die,” I shouted angrily.

  “Calm down, maybe there’s another expnation.”

  “Like what? Those Antithesis ran directly into that secure area even though there was nothing to gain. I swear I thought the Sixteen looked at me earlier, now I’m sure it’s true. If I hadn’t had two thousand points to spend I might not have made it out of there.”

  Sharron stood up straight and gave the bear a look, “Two grand for that? What does it do?”

  “It has a shield, but beyond that… fuows!”

  Spooky stepped in front of the giant bear and began to speak. “The XAR-4506 is designed for Close quarters bat. The shields on its arms allow it to close with a target, then it uses power cws to rip the target apart.” The bear raised a paw and a set of 3 foot metal cws extehey looked simir to the cutting tools found in the scrapyard, until they began to glht e. “I took the liberty of upgrading them with thermal bdes.”

  “Great, I’m gd to still be alive, but it doesn’t solve the problem of being outwitted by pnts,” I growled. “How did this happen?”

  “Aeonys and I have been discussing, and we have a theory.”

  I found a der bloearby and sat down, “Please enlighten us.”

  “We think there might be a model Twenty Six running around. Both of us excluded the possibility of a Twenty Six from our earlier calcutions because they’re rare, extremely rare. The vast majority of the time Antithesis just throw their unending numbers at a target in order to overwhelm a target. Occasionally, they try to do something clever. Twenty Sixes have the ability to pn and reason. They hide, and coordih future incursions, making things expoially harder to deal with.

  It also expins why you’ve seen so many Sixes and Sixteens, they’re all part of the same line. ahat act as the eyes, ears and hands of the more advanced model.”

  We were quiet for a moment, “So, what, the Twenty Six discovered we marked those Model Twelves ahem to a bunch of dead ends?” asked Sharron.

  “That does seem to be the case. Thankfully Twenty Sixes rarely leave the site of a hive, unless it’s being abandoned. If you find the hive you’ll find the Twenty Six.”

  I threw my hands in the air. “Oh, no problem then.”

  Humboldt shifted slightly, so I scrambled to protect my head, this time no blow came. Instead she sighed, “So what now?”

  I stood up, “We check out the lift area, it’s where the Antithesis first got down here, maybe we find some trace there.” I gnced back at the loading bay, which was blessedly quiet, "but first let's get out of here.”

  She did nue.