A shrill high pitched whine echoed through my head, causing me to roll off the back seat of my truck and flail for whatever alarm was going off. It took me a few seconds to realize the sound was actually inside my head, not from some external device.

“Nyx, what the hell are you doing? Turn it off!”

Time to get up. The team is almost done cleaning up and will be heading back your way soon.

“How long have I been out?"

Just over an hour.

“They made good progress,” I said, stumbling out the door. My eyes took a moment to adjust to the low light. “How are the defenses?”

They’re only killing a few Antithesis a minute right now. The numbers have been dropping with every hive, and now we’re only getting the dregs.

“Great. How much of my gear can we realistically recover?”

The grids and gas traps. If you had more time, and several large trucks, you could break down the walls and move them.

“Naw, fuck that. I’m not going to sit around and wait for an engineering crew, I’m still tired and it’s not worth the effort. How far out is the rest of the team?”

About ten minutes.

“Fine.” I sent out a quick command to some of the bears to retrieve my defenses, leaving just a handful to defend the walls, and all across the fortress the bears burst into motion. Some opened up the sewer accesses to retrieve the gas traps, others opened the gates and took off down the streets to retrieve the grids.

While the bears were busy I just found a quiet corner to sit down. “Since we still have a couple minutes, please get me something to eat.”

That’s how the rest of the team found me several minutes later, eating quietly in the center of my fortress while an army of bears ran to and fro.

Whisperer was the first through the gates, riding on top of her huge dog creature. “Hey kid, nice digs. You have any trouble while we were gone?”

I glanced over at the other woman, fork still in my mouth, and shot her a copy of the picture of the dead shrimp. There was a moment of silence, then Whisperer smirked, “Nice. Thanks for covering us out there, made things a lot smoother.”

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

“No problem. How about you, run into any problems out there?”

“A handful of Twenty Ones ambushed us at one point, but we handled it.” Atlantica’s voice echoed out from behind Whisperer’s wolf, so I had to lean over to the side to see the rest of the team. Both Atlantica and Humboldt waved as soon as they came into view, while Celestia was busy inspecting the UHR. “We found eight hives within a couple hundred meters of each other, which must be some sort of record. We’re lucky the tanks were reinforced to prevent flooding, it prevented the Antithesis from connecting everything up into a single hive network, and that would have been much harder to dislodge.” Atlantica leaned her oversized weapon against one of the walls and stretched out, “It took a little bit of time, but we got there in the end. I figure we’re due a break, right sis?”

Celestia straightened up and nodded slightly, “We’ve been out for quite awhile now. I think we should head back to the camp, get a few hours rest. Once the next round of evacuations are finished we’ll evaluate how everything is going, and figure out the next steps.”

“Good with me,” Humboldt said, cracking open her suit and stretching out for the first time in hours. “I could use a break.”

Whisperer nodded, then jumped down from her mount, pressed something against the wolf’s side, and watched as the beast dissolved. I raised an eyebrow as the slurry slowly drained into the sewer, “Isn’t that pretty cold, just destroying your pets like that.”

“Naw, that’s just Milo’s physical form. I’d have a hell of a time moving them around at full strength, and I’d hate myself if they permanently died in combat, so those bodies are just vessels. This is where his brain, his essence, resides.” Reaching behind her back Whisperer pulled out a large metallic orb. “It contains a full AI simulation for them to exist in, and when the bodies manifest they connect to control them. I’ll rebuild their bodies once I get back home.”

“Wait, so those things are just biological drones?”

“Kind of, I still love them like family, even if they’re not a ‘Traditional’ type of pet.”

I shrugged, “I can’t judge, I’ve become attached to giant killer teddy bears.”

While the two of us were talking Celestia walked over to the South gate, and after waiting for the conversation to end, called back to the group. “Time to get moving, the longer we wait the less time we’ll have to recover back at camp.” After a few moments the others all wandered over, heading out to their cars, but Celestia hesitated. “Hey Teddy, sorry about the attitude earlier, good work today.”

“Thanks, I appreciate… she’s already gone” I shook my head, Celestia was an enigma to me, yelling one minute and apologizing the next. At least she didn’t seem to be mad about me firing the UHR a second time.

“Alright, time to pack up, everyone into the truck.”

“Yeah… about that.” Sharron started, inspecting the inside of the vehicle. “There’s not enough space.”

“Beg pardon?”

“It was a tight fit on the way over here, but since we arrived you’ve apparently added another device to the inside, a couple dozen gadgets and weapons, and another dozen bears. Even if I get my own vehicle, which I’m going to have to do sooner or later, I still don’t think there’s enough space for all your stuff.”

I stared at the back of my truck, full of the various devices I'd bought over the last few hours, then at the huge crowd of bears standing outside. “Fuck.”

It sounds like we need to discuss new transportation options, where would you like to start?