I moved without thinking.

  “Helen! Get the lizards out of there!”

  They may be fairweather fellows but I’m not so hungry for biomass as to waste their lives frivolously. Or maybe, deep down, I’m hoping one of the iguanas eats spiders. Especially pinky fuzzy tarantulas.

  My suit squeezes through the entrance, ducking sideways and activating every flashlight I have, including the emergency parking reds before opening external speakers; as if I’m fighting shadows and not an ally. Iguanas skitter between blast doors, clearing the tunnel except for one who remains motionless.

  “Hey, clear out-” I begin, grasping his shoulder.

  I’m only half looking at him, busy looking around the bunker, scanning for the death I know is here. My small gesture sends his head rolling, cut so cleanly the two pieces stuck together until my dumbass disturbed him.

  “Trinity, we are not here to fight you. My name is Private Sable Yurten, my last orders were to obtain weaponry and join the battle, I’ve done that. The Juggernaut you ordered me to kill was destroyed, I sabotaged it and used it as a decoy to destroy two others. If you need assistance, we can- uhm- Join you.” I say, horrified as my mouth speaks words it ought not.

  The hell am I thinking? Fight alongside a bioweapon? One accident and my head would roll! Although, she would be the only target on this planet people would shoot at before my oversized marauder.

  Light sparkles against the ceiling, three drops of blood falling from a monomolecular blade’s edge. Unable to preserve the surface tension required to stick. My lights aim up, searching the ceiling for the tech demon.

  She is there. Legs split one hundred and eighty degrees apart to wedge herself between rafters. One arm is missing, along with the right side of her head.

  I can see the sparkles more clearly now, some kind of nanites working to repair what should be fatal damage. Half a skull missing, and part of her face and torso, as if she was caught in that death star beam that destroyed the front doors, tunneling tank, and Juggernaut. At this point I can only picture a Drakken laser drill.

  “Hey, you look damaged, can I uhm, get you anything? We can push deeper into the bunker if you need a few moments. Do you- are there any Technocracy enemies left within the bunker?” I call, struggling to keep my tone even.

  I’ve barely finished talking when a voice speaks from her outline.

  “Sable Yurten… That voice…”

  Speech lists and tilts, coming in odd bursts. Not too surprising given her skull is regrowing. Literally adding an appreciable amount of mass to her wounds. How little did she regenerate from? Can she come back from total destruction?

  “The only enemy left, is Athena Finley.” She whispers, using the name none should know.

  “How-”

  -Her figure vanishes. Completely invisible. I go active on sensors, lighting up the world like a dozen comsats trying to give burrowed banelings the gift of cancer. The already small thermal signature goes with her body. A true cloak. I leap sideways, angling for Trinity’s severed arm as the blade finds my neck, passing through the foot and a half of armor to sever -decapitate- my suit.

  I backpedal furiously, trying to distance myself from the insane bioweapon. Arms come up, target locks engage. There is no more hesitation in my actions, running scared is for those without the will to live. Not me.

  Both triggers depress sending four grenades on a collision course with Trinity. Blade flicks, outright cutting a bomb in half.

  My Jaw drops, barely processing that she moved faster than the speed of sound. Her weight shifts as if she were to reach out and catch the second grenade with her missing arm. It sails past her, traversing space that should have been filled with her shoulder.

  Fire backlights the demon. Blue shielding flickers on, protecting her from the molten shrapnel behind. Shields, she still has personal shielding despite missing a third of her body.

  “FUCK!”

  The odds are against me, no, she has me beat in every way.

  Her steps come quickly. Faster than time itself, spinning to slap aside my remaining -airborne- grenades. I’m still mid stride fingers pinning triggers.

  One grenade is slapped aside while the second impacts her backside. Time unfreezes. Kerrigan and Barker chase the launched form of a woman with pulser fire landing a dozen successive hits as only expert shots can. Helen cracks off six shots herself, four miss. Symbiote enhancement isn't nearly enough to keep up with purposefully engineered soldiers.

  Then the universe seems to play a cosmic joke on Trinity. Shields fade and collapse. Broken under the failed parry of my grenades and multiple plasma rounds.

  A split second later my launchers reload and send four high explosive grenades into her chest. Explosions hurl her against the wall, pounding her with sequential blasts until we run dry on ammo.

  I’m about to ask for casualties when the sensors flash. She isn’t dead. We hit her with more firepower than the Juggernaut and she is still alive. One leg is missing and her blade is nowhere to be seen, but she’s clawing her way across the ground like some reanimated corpse. Dirt furrows under her strength, like an extraordinarily heavy tank is trying to cross a condemned bridge.

  Barker howls like a damn werewolf and sprints forward, unsheathing his light ax. I pop my armor, drawing the oversized plasma pistol and putting a single shot into Trinity’s outstretched palm. Shields flicker again, somehow already recharged.

  “You’ve got to be shitting me!” I scream.

  But Barker’s axe don’t care. One strike becomes ten as the dogman swings, stabs, slices, and howls. Shields break under the barrage. Hands come off first, then arm and legs. Limbs first because despite the damage, she is still fighting, parrying each blow with an elbow or knee, as if deep down she knows all is repairable.

  So long as she survives.

  Her last limb falls away, and Barker steps back a pace, readying his ax when Trinity arches her back and mirrors his howl. I’ve heard this sound once before and not with my ears. This noise is what Kerrigan made to repulse the spinolings.

  Unlike then, Trinity is not our friend, nor are we immune. Barker freezes, Helen turns and runs, cowering behind the nearest cover, outside I can sense the Tulverians scatter. Spiderman leaps ahead of them -power armor turning him into a jumping spider-, my other troopers flee. Only Wormface remains where he is, the collective will of his thousand worms too great to fear, or maybe too decentralized to understand.

  I want to vomit. Two red hot pokers bounce around my eyeballs for every second I look at this dying bioweapon. Every atom of my being knows this is not a sight one should ever behold. Hairs stand on end, as if gathering electricity or power to-

  -She healed me with power, why hasn’t she self repaired the same way? Half a brain or not, that answer will soon reach her. We must kill her now before she can finish this spell or curse. But my armor seems locked, automatic reloads do not function, my servos don’t whine.

  I can’t aim the plasma pistol.

  Kerrigan appears next to the shrieking banshee, out of her armor. Purple afterimages bounding along behind her, so similar to Tassadar’s High Templar model in Starcraft 1. Eyes blazing like purple supernovas. Her tail flicks once, hovering over the blank face before thrusting into her neck. With three quarters of the bioweapon’s head gone it's an awkward yet easy jab that halts the scream. Limbs unfreeze, autoloaders resumed function, and I dropped the pistol. Hands shaking.

  No, not just hands, my whole body was practically seizing.

  >Executrix Alaea: Psychic feedback? What is going on?!

  Stolen novel; please report.

  >Matriarch Hygieia: Athena! GET OUT OF THERE!

  I see the words but can’t respond. Didn’t High Templars explode on death? Teeth chatter, mulching my tongue. Warm iron fills my mouth, blood or the muzzle of a pistol. Either way I lack the ability to fend it off. Something lands on my chest, knocking the wind out of my lungs so violently my gas mask flies off. Strong limbs pin my seizure, weathering the storm. Vision is the first sense to return.

  No idea when I lost sight, but it’s back now.

  Kerrigan’s stinger leaves my mouth, coated in bloody saliva. She’s fully inside my suit, curled up around my half exposed figure in no uncertain terms.

  “Ah, thank you Kerrigan, help- augh-” I retch thick phlegm from my lungs, as if ten years of hay fever leaves my sinuses at once.

  “Oh god- help- the others!” I gasp between retching.

  Kerrigan is already beside Barker, calming his own seizures. She moves through our band like an angel of healing, soothing the psychic tumults we cannot conceive let alone combat. Whatever ability she has calms our shuddering nervous systems, steadying limbs and un-knocking knees. My body shudders with pins and needles, as if every bone in my body is funny and I flicked them all.

  A long half hour of recovery ensues. Eventually we recover and regroup, taking a few moments to melt any traces of the psychic demon once known as Trinity.

  “Think the other bioweapons heard that?” I ask, grasping at hope.

  “I bet the entire planet heard that boss.” Wormface answers, moving awkwardly, “Our hive mind is disrupted again, we’ll recover but-”

  “Everything hurts like the dickens!” Grumbles Barker, holding his forehead.

  Our seizures lasted for several minutes, enough time for those outside to regroup and return. Once scattered Tulverians leer into the bunker, thermal optics locked on us. Regrouping on the periphery of my tremorsense, plenty of distance and time to warp in engineer’s armor, with all the collected overrides we’ve pilfered. I’d love to stay in the marauder, but no head means too many sensors are gone.

  We fan out slowly, filling the atrium, none of us willing to press the attack with migraines. So we spend another thirty minutes in silence, gathering our wits. Piling them into a feeble lump of courage. Kerrigan finds her way back into armor, a small nicety I’m deeply grateful for.

  >Terran Thena: I feel like that bitch steamrollered my brain then punched both ovaries. But I’m fine. Trin is dead.

  >Matriarch Hygieia: good

  >Matriarch Hygieia: glad your safe

  >Matriarch Hygieia: my LZ is clear for now

  >Matriarch Hygieia: need some lings?

  I glanced around at the squad, Barker -for the first time in his life- is silent, Wormy is shambling around like a zombie and the Troopers are all huddled together holding their heads like they might roll away.

  >Terran Thena: Yes please. We got shaken up pretty hard. I’d ask for roaches but if they die like those other ones I don’t want em at all.

  >Matriarch Hygieia: died like the other ones?

  >Terran Thena: Yeah, back near the Tulverian ambush we got hit by roaches.

  >Matriarch Hygieia: ooohhh

  >Matriarch Hygieia: those were not my roaches

  >Matriarch Hygieia: they were Zazathur’s test product, the one he gave to Ardain

  >Matriarch Hygieia: they cost less biomass but are weak lil pussies

  >Terran Thena: Oh… Okay. uhm…

  My thoughts trail off, too focused on my shuddering hand. I feel like an invalid, incapable of autonomy.

  >Matriarch Hygieia: sending four lings to you and one of my special projects

  >Matriarch Hygieia: roaches are busy scavenging

  >Matriarch Hygieia: got a dozen lings if you are desperate but they are my only defenders

  >Matriarch Hygieia: spending every gram of biomass on building the ship

  >Terran Thena: That should be enough. Thank you Hygieia.

  Ling1 and Lingling2 appear, receiving headpats like the goodboys they are. The other two spinolings slink to the rear, unfamiliar with affection or life itself. Smaller than Ling1 and Lingling2 with double the spines yet half as tall. They must be juveniles, freshly born and lacking experience. Although, the Collective’s hive mind ought to have provided all the necessary knowledge, just as flash training brought Earthlings into the galactic war.

  “Alright, spread out, if you find any humans I want to know about them. Defend yourselves as necessary but the mission is to capture this base intact with all the knowledge we can. Including any personnel.” I order.

  Lingling2 rolls his eyes, then trots off into the dark pausing a moment to ruff at the younger lings. Ling 1 takes up the rear, headbutting buttholes until the younger lings chase after Lingling2. They sweep the room, a shadow floating behind them.

  It enters our collective conscious before our vision. Unthreatening to us, lethal to all others. Large, like a horse yet longer and lower. Silent claws leave indentations on the reinforced floor, claws so sharp they tear into Technocracy building materials, a sort of diamond impregnated epoxy meant to seal the floor and ceiling while also acting as structural support. Something not even a Juggernaut’s treads could do.

  >Terran Thena: What did you send? Why is it hard to see?

  >Matriarch Hygieia: hehehe

  >Matriarch Hygieia: tell it to bite something and find out

  I shrug, trusting myself in another body.

  “Alright sneaky. Go help the lings.”

  It growls. A throaty shudder that makes my ears pop and teeth chatter, Wormface falls on his ass -we’re all fragile after Trinity’s final curse- then the shadow bounds after the lings, making less noise than far smaller creatures. So its stealthy and slow, odd evolution choice, but if Hygieia said to bite something, this ought to be interesting.

  >Terran Thena: Not picking up anything on Tremorsense, how is that ship coming?

  >Matriarch Hygieia: this isnt sc2

  >Matriarch Hygieia: cant just poof a battlecruiser out every 64 seconds

  >Matriarch Hygieia: takes time

  >Matriarch Hygieia: gotta make the fungus to grow the superstructure

  >Matriarch Hygieia: but before that you have to dig a hole big enough to fit in and protect it

  >Matriarch Hygieia: then grow the other sixty nine fungi that will create the individual systems

  >Matriarch Hygieia: after that I have to feed them

  >Matriarch Hygieia: but youre sending all the biomass to dead men

  >Matriarch Hygieia: you are falling short Thena

  >Terran Thena: How short?

  >Matriarch Hygieia: 1500

  >Matriarch Hygieia: at this rate four months to build

  >Terran Thena: FOUR MONTHS?!

  >Matriarch Hygieia: radiation is worse than expected

  >Matriarch Hygieia: lots of deleterious mutations

  >Matriarch Hygieia: we need a constant influx of biomass not promises to feed iguanas!

  >Matriarch Hygieia: manage your resources Athena.

  >Matriarch Hygieia: NOT ENOUGH MINERALS MINE MORE MINERALS

  >Terran Thena: Yeah, sure, I'll just call down the mules I don’t have to harvest mineral patches that don’t exist!

  >Matriarch Hygieia: could really use a hundred odd iguana bodies…

  >Terran Thena: No. I’m not fragging my only allies!

  >Matriarch Hygieia: what if they turn on you first?

  I end the chat. Lifting my mask to spit blood onto the floor. Feels like I bit my tongue fifty times, with rifts and valleys criss crossing it. Worse, I can feel nanites stitching it together, slowly tying cells to each other as the cells regenerate of their own accord.

  Okay okay, it’s super cool. Painful and weird as hell. But cool enough I try and focus on the sensation to avoid thoughts of magic space demons.

  And equally disgusting.

  Almost as distasteful as talk of stabbing the iguanas up their tails. Hygieia’s devoted to the collection of biomass, a goal we share… Except… Do we? Was I always so focused, so stubborn as Hygieia is now? I spit more bloody phlegm, clearing my mouth before sealing my mask and power armor.

  We haven’t cleared the bunker yet. That comes before bickering ninnies. A cursory examination of the atrium shows this was only a sort of quadruple airlock with guard posts and overlapping lanes of fire every ten feet. More braindead cyborgs remain at their posts bearing the marks of Trinity. I’d love to find that pirate looking gun of hers, the one that fired three shots at a time instead of one, but no luck. Nor are there any heads to salvage as she blew apart each skull with unerring savagery.

  But these Earthlings were already dead, their bodies functioned without their brains, a terrible fate. Better to render them into biomass for the ship, and protect Earth’s heirs with their armor.

  [+22 technician power armors]

  [+20 biomass] [half sent to ship]

  I mentally request an update to the total counts, frowning at how much it reduced my biomass income cause the heads were gone. Guess brains are complicated to grow.

  16 / 24 Biomass (Hygieia’s pool of available biomass)

  334 / 2000 Courier Ship Progress

  10 / 62 Mechanized (lots of lobotomized soldiers)

  1 / 1 Protochronian Artefacts

  2 Nanofactories

  (about 400 biomass in the open field near the 2 destroyed plasma-juggernauts)

  The number kicks me in the lungs. Sixty two power armors. I knew we were raking them in with the captured technicians but hadn’t realized we’d gathered more than twenty out there.

  I’m not alone anymore.

  My squad can no longer be designated as a squad, nor a platoon. We are finally an army. And I’m about to capture the factory.

  “Feels amazing when a plan starts to come together.” I say, marching deeper into the Bunker’s confines.

  Completely forgetting that Trinity called me by my real name. Even if I had remembered, I would not have cared, it’s not like the bioweapons are piloted remotely, there is no way for Trinity to have passed information onto any others.