“Samurai specialties? Yeah, we all have them. Some newbies even end up with solid themes before they’ve killed their first hive.

But the one thing you’ll almost never find, is a Samurai without options. It doesn’t matter how niche our interests, nor how limited our catalogues. If there’s something we want to do, our AIs have the perfect suggestion.

Take right now, for example. I just asked her, and Liandry gave me a whopping four hundred and eighty-three unique methods I could use to cook you alive!”

--Shadowflame, minutes before burning down a tv studio in an argument with their AI.

Chip and Stripe both look away from their brother receiving my attention and share a look, nodding before turning to confront the approaching plants.

Aww. Maybe the Human Thoughts were worth it. That was adorable.

They both pull a grenade from the bags on their backs, holding them and waiting for the walking shrubbery to gather up as they rush towards us. They twist the needlers before stretching their arms back and lobbing the grenades over the charging bushes.

Instantly, both of them turn on their heels and bolt towards me.

Does this make it less cute?

Fluff time is interrupted when the two fluff balls dive into my arms, radiating smugness into the back of my mind as I wrap them in a hug and turn my back on the needles raining down on us.

More impacts come this time, but I shrug it off and quickly unfurl, turning around with Chip and Stripe held by the backs of their necks. A wide swathe of the plants directly in front of us have collapsed to the ground with varying levels of festering damage, but a quick glance shows more of them flooding onto the street, and I even notice a few Fives approaching in the distance.

{If you’re going to throw grenades,} I squeak, winding my arms down. {Make sure you get them all.}

I throw them both up and they rise, flipping through the air before grabbing onto the lip of the plain boxy-looking building next to us. I pick up Spot next, kicking away a Three that scrambles over the bubbling corpse of one of its comrades to leap at me as I place him on my shoulder.

Sim removes most of the pockets lining my legs and slims the fit of my trousers as a big pouch of fabric forms on my back. Spot quickly crawls into it, spinning himself around to rest his chin against my shoulder with loose fabric draped over his snoot, concealing him completely.

Sim’s the best!

We fade out of sight, and I start silently sidling along the edge of the building, trying to move out of the focus of the growing horde.

I see a few needlers drop from above, and this time I get to watch them as they activate, spraying multiple dense waves of tiny needles. The few that hit me bounce off as usual, though I instinctively raise a hand to protect my eyes still. The impacts I’m feeling may be small, but I still don’t want to feel them on my eyeballs.

More plants drop, and more grenades follow, so I turn my focus to the ground.

‘Cyon, where are all these coming from?’

What a surprise, it would appear that the White Rhinos’ resistance has ended.

‘Is that… sarcasm?’

I dodge the jaws of a Three that sniffed me as I stepped too close, slashing its throat before slipping past it, narrowing my focus on a distant Five.

‘Is this because I shushed you?

These Models are leaving their compound and converging upon your position.

I feel like the lack of a response says enough, but that sounds bad, so I drop it for now.

‘That’s bad, right?’ I ask, slipping between two Threes, running my blades along their sides as I pass and leaping at a Five as it shoots quills into the building below Chip and Stripe.

The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

My claws rip through its flesh easily, and after carving four deep grooves that bubble and fester from my bacteria infecting it, I spring off the dying plant and land on a Three beside it, smashing its skull into the ground before driving a blade into its back.

There are only a few reasons the Antithesis would choose to ignore a large gathering of living beings. Either there’s a recognised threat nearby that’s a higher priority, or they aren’t living anymore.

I create some distance from the dead Five and the plants around it frantically searching for the killer, keeping away from their noses as best as I can. I should ask Cyon about removing my scent later.

‘Any chance I’m a big threat?’

To this degree? I doubt it. In fact, such a strong reaction to a dead Nine’s pheromones would suggest the possibility of a control unit.

‘Like those Sixes?’

A letterbox lashes out at me as I get too close to it trying to avoid a Four. It draws a thin line along my ribs, splitting Sim open and drawing a shallow line of blood before my arm snaps out, slicing its top off. Sim quickly liquifies and stretches back together, but all of the nearby bushes snap their attention to me, and a burst of tentacles from the Four hits me.

I hop up as a bladeless tentacle drives into my chest, letting it send me flying backwards before the more dangerous followers can catch me. I twist in midair, slashing a Three that leaps up to meet my quickly-moving, shimmering form before I hit the ground and bounce, rolling onto my feet and shooting off into the crowd, sliding under a dog and slashing its belly as the majority of the xenos lose track of me again, getting distracted by another burst of needles erupting in their midst.

Possibly, or a Model Seventeen. If this hive has been hidden for long, that is entirely possible.

Well, that doesn’t sound hopeful.

I move to the edge of the swarm, slipping into a side alley and leaping up to grab onto a raised walkway to get away from the dogs filing onto the open street to join the crowd gathering below Chip and Stripe. I disable my invisibility, fading back into existence and removing Sim from my face for a moment to catch my breath.

[{How are you guys for grenades?}] I ask my siblings on the roof through our connection, receiving two bursts of giddy excitement that bring a smile to my face before an articulated response.

[{Two left each,}] Stripe squeaks back. [{Refill soon?}]

[{I’ll be there in a moment.}]

‘Hey Cyon, how should I deal with this? Do I just clear the horde, or should I be searching for a Seventeen?’

I believe you can complete both tasks at the same time. If you get within range of your siblings again and refill their grenade stocks, they can act as a distraction and clear the horde while you search for the Seventeen.

I glance over at Stripe and Chip’s position and see the plants entering the building below them, and there are several chunks of the building’s face falling away as more spines from the other Fives further up the street smash into it.

‘I’m not sure they can act as a distraction for long enough.’

If you would like to give them more security, could I suggest sending Spot up to them with some mobility upgrades to help them change positions?

‘Sure. I assume you have something in mind,’ I say while standing up from my crouched position on the walkway, activating my invisibility again and stepping over the edge, falling into the alley below, directly on top of a Three.

My heel drives the dog’s head into the ground, and I step off it to the side before leaning down and slashing a shallow wound along the back of its neck, injecting just enough bacteria to kill it, draining the last of the solution from my gloves. The three empty vials on the back of my hand fire off, and three more spawn into place before my eyes without me needing to ask, quickly being covered by Sim and fading out of sight again.

I do, I would suggest-

‘One sec,’ I interrupt, kicking a doggo deeper into the alley as it tries to snap at where my hand just was. ‘Grenade please.’

A silver orb with a big red button appears in front of me, and my eyes snap onto it in an instant. My grin widens as an idea strikes me, so I spin around, batting the falling grenade’s button with my tail and knocking the orb into the alley before leaping out onto the main street.

A loud bang behind me makes my ears drop flat to my head, and a wave of heat bursts from the alley, distracting the nearby plants and making it easier for me to slip between them unnoticed.

I would suggest unlocking Prolotor Combat Utilities for seventy points and purchasing your siblings a Prolotor Emissive Land Traverser for twenty points each.

I spot a Five not too far away as I cross the street, poking out above several Threes and aiming at my siblings, so I hold up my arm in a throwing position, feeling a hefty knife drop into my hand without asking, before whipping it forward.

The traversers can replace the straps of their grenade bags, and they utilise bursts of compressed air to deploy movement anchors that will allow your siblings to easily travel from roof to roof without risking extended exposure to the horde below.

The knife cuts through the air without a sound and slams into the car-sized bush. However, instead of simply killing it, the moment the knife sinks into the plant its legs give out and it starts convulsing. Red and blue lines spread out along its skin, and a moment later the bush violently explodes, flinging red and blue dyed flesh onto the smaller Models nearby.

‘What was that?’ I ask Cyon in awe, completely skipping over the PELTs as I reach the same side of the street as my siblings, several buildings away thanks to the distance I created with them.

I leap up towards an open window, catching the lip and scrambling up to perch in it, overlooking the still-increasing horde of plants no longer being cut down by grenades from above.

That was a Nano-Injecting Throwing Knife loaded with GorillaBomb E3, a fast-acting bacterial strain that causes a rapid buildup of gas inside the target Antithesis’ body, along with spreading an enzyme to break down their flesh. It leads to the effect you just saw. It’s known as a corpse explosion by the Prolotor researchers who created it.

“Awesome,” I mutter out loud, dropping my invisibility and feeling a small twinge in my gut asking me to snack. “Now, how about those PELTs?”