595 smiled, ducking under a stalactite and swerving round a stalagmite in quick succession. So there was a common ground between the two of them after all. “Neat. Is there a Datius for every field, then?”

Suddenly, the agent’s sensory net detected a fork in the path ahead, going up and off to the right. Imagining it from the outside, 595 guessed it headed toward the next mountain along in the chain. Their current path continued going straight forward.

As they approached the convergence, 595 slowed her sprint down to a jog, before stopping altogether in the centre of the fork. She could see now that the stream came from the sharper incline on the right, cascading down both of the other paths. “If straight-on is going downwards now, I think we have less chance of being deposited on the top of a mountain heading that way.” 595 surmised.

After a few moments, an alien chittering echoed through the cavern, marginally louder than the tinkling of water. Finally! 595 drew her pistol and checked her sensory net again. Another ping revealed moving objects on the right path. "Did you hear that? I think it came from this way. We’ll need to check that out; can’t have any critters cutting us off.” she sent, eagerly moving toward the opening.

“Hold right there.” Rareth ordered as soon as the Agent started to move off along the side passage. “If you are going to help me, you must move behind me, not ahead. It is necessary for us to scout these caves for danger, but we are not here to exterminate every pest that might live here. Follow behind me, and we will see what is living here, but do not simply shoot on sight. If these are simple animals, they may simply flee when they see us. If they attack, I will kill them.”

Regardless of what 595 might have thought about Rareth taking the lead, it was not as if there would be much hope of overtaking her once she did get moving. There was no feasible way of moving their entire group through the caves stealthily, with all of their equipment, when the tight passages would carry the echoes of every single footstep far and wide. Since they would not have the option of stealth later, Rareth made no attempt to hide now. If something was going to attack, she wanted it to attack her, without the civilians present. Ideally, whatever creatures they encountered would either flee on sight, or they would be able to scare them off. If not, she would need to assess how much of a threat they posed.

“Hey, you don’t automatically get to take point like that!” 595 called out loud as Rareth ran past her, before giving chase. “Everything alright in there?” Thebes crackled feebly over comms. “Yeah, all good. We’re checking out some noises.” 595 quickly replied before Rareth got a chance to. “Want some assistance?” He asked. “No, we’re fine for now. Maintain your perimeter.” She snapped.

They moved quickly uphill through a gradually tightening passageway. Before long, 595’s sensory net described a series of large circular hollows off of the main path. The chittering grew louder and louder, and the smell emulsified into a pungent, wet, rotting tsunami that forced the agent to close her visor again. The moving objects were close now, all around really, and moving in random patterns.

Until they weren’t. Almost simultaneously, most of the motion blips stopped. So did the incessant chittering.

595 instinctively slowed her pace just behind and to one side of Rareth, and moved her pistol into centre axis relock. They took a few steps forward. The agent wet her dry throat.

Her suit pinged movement on the ceiling of the cavern, 595 marked it. It looked like a flat insect head with some pincers. It peeked from an opening that may have connected this area to one of the spherical hollows.

The creature carefully lowered it’s armoured body and many legs down onto the ground, before shuffling toward them, staying low to the rock. A couple more of them appeared from opening in the sides of the space behind it. The chittering and movement started again, deafening and on all sides. Each of the creature’s tails lit up, casting long shadows in the confined space.

Rareth did not back away, at least not at first. The creatures seemed to have their own passageways, likely dug themselves, that branched off from the main passages. It was an important detail to remember, though the insects in front of her were more of a concern at the moment. She also scanned them as much as possible and made note of what she could observe of their morphology. They were long, slender, and seemed equipped to deal with tough prey. In any case, Rareth still stayed calm regardless of the numbers in front of her.

In an elongated bubble around Rareth, the Agent would be able to see her energy shield become visible in the air as it turned translucent and started to refract the light passing through it. She had modulated it to allow it to protect against lower velocity attacks. In normal use, an energy shield would protect against high energy or high velocity projectiles, while slower moving objects could pass through it. They could, however, be modulated to become more like solid walls blocking any object attempting to pass. The disadvantage in this state was that the shield would block attacks in either direction, so Rareth would need to lower it whenever she made any attacks herself.

“Are you mere animals, or are you intelligent?” Rareth questioned towards the insects. After the worm had turned out to be an intelligent entity, it was plausible that any creature they encountered could be sapient. “If you are, we have no intention to hurt you. If not…” Her voice trailed off as she glanced down at 595. “Let’s start backing away and return to the first passage. If they let us go, we will leave them be.”

The many-legged creatures didn’t react to Rareth’s call in any discernible way. They carried on shuffling forward, their heads rippling slightly from side to side and their segmented bodies following. The loud chittering continued.“Fuck that. We’re getting through this cavern.” 595 spat.

She activated a lighting sequence she’d quickly pieced together on the walk after the lake. Her suit flashed bright red in an aggressive, undulating pattern. Dr Ngata had assured her in private that it replicated many of the same defence mechanisms that animals used back on Outremer. 595 turned up her external speaker and stepped forward before talking. “Stop right there! DO NOT MOVE.”

The creatures immediately cried out at the sound and light. They erected their front halves in the air, mouths and pincers pointing toward the interlopers. “They’re going to attack!” 595 yelled, firing her pistol on automatic at the first creature from about twenty metres away. The shots connected with it’s mouthparts and eyes, sending chain lightning between all three of them.

The whole area erupted with frenetic screeching. All three of the creatures began spitting viscous green blobs of material at them, one of which landed squarely on 595’s head. “Acid!” She yelled, glancing at her readout. It fizzled against her shields, using up power in the process.

This time, it seemed, the insects really were simple animals. 595’s light display did seem like a good idea to scare them off, though unfortunately, it did not seem to be enough. When the creatures reared up, she switched to the third firing mode on her fusion cannon, which turned it into a plasma thrower. It could shoot forward a dense cloud of superheated plasma, much like a flamethrower. It was bright and immensely hot, neither of which would be too appealing to any creature on the receiving end.

Rareth’s suit identified the acid as a corrosive agent as soon as it hit her shields. There was some drain to her shielding, but the acid was not too much of a concern. Although it was good to know these things had the capability; it could be more of a threat to others in their group. In any case, Rareth soon let loose a stream of plasma in a wide arc in front of them. Its glow easily illuminated the cave, and its heat would hopefully encourage anything it did not incinerate to run away. As she had said to the Agent, she was not here to be an exterminator.

The creatures disappeared in the massive ball of plasma-fire as it filled the narrow space. 595 fired her pistol gleefully into the inferno, until all three of the beasts charged out of the maelstrom.

They were closer now, and coated in plasma. They screamed and chittered, rushing forward with their front halves raised to trample them. The creatures were bigger than both of the soldiers, and angrier too now.

Rareth quickly moved her fusion cannon to her back as the creatures emerged from the cloud of plasma. Visual scans showed their shells were melting, but not quickly. Its composition appeared to be closer to that of rock than chitin, hence the heat resistance. It would not be immune, but another approach might be more effective, not that there were too many choices for Rareth. By the time her weapon was away, the first creature was already close upon her.

Rather than run or dodge, Rareth elected to meet her foe head-on. She modulated her shields to their normal state before rushing forward herself at one of the creatures. When the pair met, the sound was like a clash of titans. Metal struck stone, and they both stopped one another in their tracks. To avoid being pushed back, Rareth had to dig her feet into the ground, cracking the stone underneath her and pushing her feet into the cavern floor itself. The stone insect was massive, but so too was Rareth’s strength.

As they pushed against one another, Rareth gripped the beast’s mandibles from the inside as it tried to close them around Rareth’s head, while she pushed outward to stop them…then start prying them apart. Far from her usual military professionalism, Rareth let out her own bestial roar as she pushed back, then steadily lifted up the insect. It took considerable exertion even for her, but while still gripping its mandibles as handholds, she turned and pushed all of her strength at once into throwing the creature. She sent it through the air and slammed its full weight into a second creature that had tried rushing past her towards the Agent.

595 ran through the gap Rareth had created past the first two creatures. With the ease of someone who practiced weapon assembly in their sleep, she attached her energy dagger to the front of her spook pistol like a bayonet while on the move.

The third beast was advancing more slowly and cautiously, but lifted up it’s impressive head and lunged for her as she approached head-on. The agent turned on a coin, juking around the massive pincers. She skirted the cavern wall, pushed off of a stalagmite with one foot and landed on the creature’s armoured back.

The thing chittered manically and bounced from one side of its legs to the other, trying to throw her off. But 595 perched in place, one hand gripping the edge of it’s armour plating to stabilise her footing. Picking her moment, she clambered forward until she was right behind the creature’s head. She could hear that it was spitting acid at Rareth while trying to throw her off, and could see the other creatures had untangled in quick time.

595’s suit identified two potential weak points to try. The first was on the sides near it’s legs and the second was underneath the armour plating on its head. From where she stood, the agent could see a crack in it’s armour where two plates overlapped on the back of its ‘neck’. This seemed like the most promising bet to her.

Using her bayoneted pistol with both hands like a shovel, 595 reached up and jammed the energy blade between the two plates repeatedly, firing her pistol until she suddenly it was stuck. She kept firing. The creature screamed and rolled over suddenly, taking the agent with it.

Rareth had to decide quickly how to follow through. The Agent rushed one of the creatures, and she did not have time to concern herself with whether or not the Human would succeed. The Agent had insisted upon coming along, so it was her fault if she could not hold her own. Just a few seconds after throwing the creature, Rareth rushed after it to press the advantage.

The creature Rareth had thrown fared better than the one she had struck with it. There was quite a distinctive sound to their shells cracking against one another. The one underneath had been crushed between the the ground and the weight of the other insect, and so was squirming from its injuries. Although, neither were close to death. The top creature started to rear up again, which was met by Rareth charging straight into it to slam it up against the wall of the cave. The one on the ground would surely be scrambling to turn on her soon, and the other had already struck her shields with acid, but she had a few seconds, at least, to deal with the one in her grip.

Rareth pressed her hand against the equivalent of the creature’s throat to hold it up against the wall for a moment as she reared her hand back. Its legs tried scratching at her armor while its mandibles snapped loudly at the air, but there was nothing to stop Rareth pulling back for one, good punch. One punch that landed with all the strength her body could produce. One punch that shattered the stone shell just below its neck, pierced through the soft tissue, broke out of the shell on the far side, and finally smashed part of the cavern wall behind it.

595’s suit alarms pinged as the massive centipede rolled her flat. “Pressure warning. Twenty eight thousand kilopascals. Please remove..-” The Agent left her pistol lodged in the thing’s head and pushed against the thing’s body with both her arms and legs. Her grunt of exertion turned into a shout as its mass gradually began rolling off the other side.

The beast must have sensed it was going to flip back over, because it decided to right itself. The roll accelerated rapidly, with 595 providing more encouragement as she freed her right arm and leg. It’s head crushed the wedged pistol against the floor, driving the bayonet and barrel deep into the soft tissue.

The centipede gurgled, thrashing about desperately as it completed the roll. 595 didn’t waste time, jumping to her feet and leaping onto its neck again. She hung on for dear life, yelling angrily as the creature careened around the narrow passage. They crashed against a wall and clung on by virtue of the bayonet stuck in it’s armour. She yanked it out and shoved her hand in the cavity instead.

Suddenly, she could feel the thing’s primitive thoughts and feelings, it’s pain and drive to protect the hive. She grasped her hand around that consciousness and squeezed like she’d been taught, all those years ago. Their mouths opened simultaneous and the same incandescent burst emitted from both. And then, the centipede disintegrated into a heap of black particles with one last screech and 595 disappeared in a flash of light.

Rareth quickly pulled her hand from the screaming, squirming creature and tossed it aside with the hope that the wound would be enough to incapacitate or kill it. What demanded more of her attention than the creatures was the incomprehensible occurrence with the Agent. Even with her many, many years of experience, she was not quite certain what had transpired. It was a definite reminder that this place was not reality, no matter how convincing it seemed. The creature, by whatever means, disappeared into ash, and Rareth lost 595 in a flash of light that even her own sensors did not adjust to in time.

The third creature, in the time it was given, did manage to recover from the hit it took and turn on Rareth. It lunged at her, slamming her back against the cave wall with its mandibles latched firmly around her torso. The insect squeezed to try and crush her body between them, but Rareth seemed to have an almost apathetic calm about her. She looked down on it as if it was a nuisance, as she had felt the strength of their mandibles herself during the first attack. She knew well that her armor could hold up long enough for her to take the time to deploy the particle cannon in her right arm, stuff the barrel into its mouthparts, and fire down the length of its body. What happened to the agent was far more interesting to her than killing simple insects.

She opened her eyes slowly, blinking in the light. She could see her own bare hands laying on a moss-strewn stone floor in front of her. Pushing down on the floor, she rose to her knees. Her breath billowed away from her in clouds of vapour. She groggily looked around, trying to focus on her surroundings.

She was in a vast square pergola. Detailed stone pillars surrounded her, holding up a heavy roof. Icy wind howled through the gaps between pillars, dredging up constellations of dust from the floor and whipping the sconced torches into long thin needles of fire. In front of her, up a few steps, was an exquisite throne.

Something was sitting there, but she couldn’t see what. Rays of light blinded her when she tried, like how she imagined looking at a sun would feel. “Tell me.” a voice commanded, in a strange language that she somehow understood. She tried to clamp her mouth closed, but the words forced their way out. Long streams of them in the same tongue.

Her back stiffened and her face rose to stare at the ceiling as information poured out of her mouth. She tried to hold onto what it all meant, but it’s meaning slipped from her grasp as quickly as it’d arrived. Despite the freezing wind, she was sweating.

She flitted in and out of consciousness, but eventually the talking stopped. She collapsed onto the floor, face to the ground. A cool hand stroked her forehead, like she imagined a mother would’ve done. “Shhh...shhh.” the voice soothed. She slept.

Rareth dropped the last of the insects to the ground with a hole clean through the center of its head. The kinetic impact of a particle cannon was more immediately effective than the more diffuse cloud of plasma. Though, she supposed more concentrated heat sources would still burn through the stone shell quickly. In any case, she kept her particle cannon deployed as she turned her attention to scanning her surroundings. Whatever happened to the Agent, Rareth needed to act quickly. She still hoped to find her somewhere, even if that seemed unlikely. She had disappeared in a sudden, impossible manner, and Rareth’s sensor recordings were not giving any hints she could identify at the moment.

There was noise from farther down the cave, in the direction the pair had been heading before the ambush. Despite all that Rareth now had to be concerned about, she still had to make herself focus. Whether she found 595 or not, she would still need to scout the route through the mountain. The noises Rareth heard were a kind of chittering that sounded like it originated from the insects. She would have preferred not to have to interact with them further, but the path through the mountain required it, Rareth would have to deal with them.

It was not a far walk to reach the next chamber, and there was a lot for her to take in when she arrived. It was a fairly tall, wide chamber with more than a few smaller, paler version of the same insects that had ambushed her, along with a few larger creatures in-sight. Interestingly, there were also many unnatural-looking stone structures embedded into the walls and floor. They appeared as small, elongated domes made of rock, and were certainly not normal features in caves. However, what drew her primary focus was the Human shape she spotted laying at the center of the chamber. Rareth naturally recognized her right away, but of course, there was no explanation for how she got here and why she looked to be asleep, or otherwise unconscious.

The Agent started to stir as Rareth walked forward. She intended to bring the Human back to their camp to recover regardless of what objections she tried to raise. This was all terribly unusual, and Rareth did not like any part of it. She had seemingly disappeared from reality in a blinding flash of light, only to suddenly be found again a short distance away, unconscious and without her IFF tag transmitting. Rareth felt she had plenty of reason to doubt, but for now, she would just deal with the problems in front of her. She was not directly hostile towards the creatures, but if either herself or 595 were threatened, she would fight as many as was necessary to leave.

595 propped herself up with one arm as her suit powered back on. She looked woozily around her as items appeared back in her HUD one by one. This must have been where they birthed new centipede things. There were different sizes of creatures here, from tiny handfuls to adults about half the size of the monsters that’d attacked them. They all kept their distance, writhing over one another as far from her prone form as they could. It didn't seem like they had any fight left in them.

The Agent got clumsily to her feet as Rareth came and towered over her. “What happened? Did you get them?” She brushed past the Datius, back out into passage and over to where the centipede corpses lay dead. She picked up her pistol from the ground and inspected it for damage, before clocking the heap of black ash on the floor. She recognised what it was immediately, but didn’t remember creating it, which was unusual. She noted that her urges were sated, at least right now. She must have been knocked out right after feeding.

595 turned to the Datius, who had followed her out. She wondered what the Rothian had seen. “Well? Did you see what happened?"

Rareth kept aware of the movements around her, but she was happy to keep her distance from the insects as well. As long as they allowed herself and the Agent to pass, they would not come to harm. As for the Agent herself, Rareth did not have enough information to so much as guess at what had transpired. She archived everything her sensors had recorded about the event, but she was not certain how much they would learn from it.

On approach, Rareth looked over 595 closely for any signs of injury. Her suit did not seem to be damaged, though if there were any internal injuries, they would require a more detailed examination to detect. “Whatever happened occurred quickly. And whatever happened was nothing possible in our reality. Something killed the insect you were fighting by disintegrating it into dust, then you disappeared in a flash of light and reappeared here. We are not far from where we were, but still, you did not move here yourself. We need to move quickly; I want us to leave this simulation as soon as we can. It does not necessarily have to conform to the rules of our reality, clearly. Let us go back to the camp. The team’s medic can examine you, while I finish scouting these caves.”

595 regarded Rareth silently for a moment, her expression grim. “No need.” She replied finally. “I’m perfectly healthy. We’ll scout the place together.” She looked around at the various openings to hollows nearby. None of the centipedes had followed them back out. “I think we’ve neutralised the threats here. Let’s return to the fork and investigate the main path.”

595 turned to leave just as a wave of dizziness crashed into her like a speeding bullet. She stumbled through the pile of ash and put a hand on one of the cavern walls to support her. Nausea punched the Agent in the stomach, doubling her over. She peeled back her visor and ejected a small amount of bile onto the floor. Keeping her back to the Datius, 595 straightened up slightly and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. She tasted metal.

Putting her visor back in place, she reversed the field to get a view of herself. Blood dripped slowly from one of her nostrils, which she’d now smeared across her face. She was feeling a bit better after being sick though, so she straightened up and turned back to Rareth. “I’m fine, really! Just felt a bit nauseous is all.” She insisted.

“Agent, Datius - come in.” Thebes crackled over comms. 595 jumped on it, surveying their surroundings. “Yes?”

“Ma’am. We’ve made contact with the outside.” Thebes crackled over comms. “They want to speak with both of you.” 595 looked back at Rareth. “Can you patch them through to our suits?” There was a short delay, presumably so Thebes could ask. “Negative. They need to work on all our suits.” 595 huffed. “Ok, we’ll be there shortly. How is the transit station?”

“They’re still tinkering with it, ma’am.” 595 kissed her teeth. “Copy that. Maintain your position.” She signed off, thinking of how best to proceed. “Do you want to scout the other path, while I make my way back? I’ll deal with whoever wants to talk to me before you get back, freeing up the line.”

The Agent would not have been able to see it under Rareth’s helmet, but she was giving 595 a rather judgmental glare as she looked down upon her. She glanced back towards the entrance to the chamber for a moment and reviewed the map of the cave network she had made thusfar. “As I said, I will continue scouting and find a way through the mountain. Thebes is perfectly qualified to talk with the others. You need to return to the camp and allow the medic to see you. You are not healthy, and don’t insult my intelligent by trying to pretend that you are. Anything could have happened to you when you were transported to this room.”

Rareth paused for just a moment in thought. “Do you remember anything of what happened to you? If so, you need to make sure it is recorded in a report. Anything could be important. But do it back at camp; we should move in case these insects decide to stop tolerating us.”

595 knew Thebes was qualified to handle reporting back. But she suspected someone in the real world had a very specific set of questions for her alone. That was the only reason she could think of for them to request her on comms. “Alright, fine! I’ll get myself checked out.” She sighed, setting off back down the path they’d come when Rareth asked if she remembered anything.

“Not really. I remember getting on one’s back and piercing under the plate at the back of its head. The next thing I remember is waking up in that hollow.” She answered as they walked back to the fork together. “Good luck. I’ll see you back at camp soon.” 595 said her farewell to Rareth before following the stream back out of the cave system the same way they’d come. She didn’t sprint as before, but jogged and thought about what had happened.

After a little while, 595 emerged from the pitch-black cavern onto the ridge overlooking the swampy valley. She could see her team’s silhouettes and IFF tags dotted around comms mast and half-constructed transit station. Saddam greeted her with a thumbs up that she returned. “Welcome back.” Thebes held up an interface cable attached to the comms mast as the Agent jogged over. “Private line to the Captain.”

595 took the lead from the soldier. “Thank you.” She looked over at Knossos, the medic. “Can you check my vitals please?” The olive-colored operator wordlessly gave up their position on the perimeter to jog over.

The Agent plugged the interface cable into her left arm just next to her wrist interface. Knossos plugged another cord into her suit’s diagnostics port at the back soon after. 595 accepted the call, standing still to let Knossos do his job. “Go.” She answered. After a short pause, the reply crackled through. “I’m glad you’re still alive, Agent. I won’t keep you long as Dr Lang wants to keep things moving.” Andersen spoke quickly.

“Your...colleagues on Outremer have asked if what you’ve found changes their plans at all?” 595 smirked; she’d guessed correctly. “You can tell them to proceed as planned. I will have more information tomorrow.”

Once the pair separated at the fork, Rareth picked up her pace heading deeper into the cave. In truth, she was not completely certain about the idea of even separating from the Agent for the short time it would take her to get back to camp, as it did feel like a risk not to supervise her. However, enough time had been wasted already, and Rareth needed to find if there was a way through the caves quickly. Granted, now that they had made contact with the outside, they would not be in quite as much of a rush. They would not longer be in danger of being pulled out of the simulation early as those on the outside became more concerned.

On her own, Rareth could move more quickly through the network of caves, though perhaps not by too much. The Agent had kept up adequately, but Rareth truly had no reason to hold back once she only had herself to worry about. She mapped the cave as she went along and, for the most part, was able to choose the correct path ahead of time thanks to her echolocating ability. Her best option was to follow the stream as much as possible. If it had carved out the cave, then it would be the most likely path out to the other side.

Rareth only slowed down when she encountered more of the stone-shelled insects. Although, this time, the encounter did not turn to violence. It occurred in a large enough chamber that she was able to skirt around the side near the wall to keep distance, while the insects seemed intent on doing the same. They were carrying back something with them, perhaps some prey, but while they did hiss and posture upon spotting her, they did not rush her like last time. Rareth was not sure what exactly caused the difference in response, but it was not her concern to figure out the particulars of the creatures’ behavior. All she needed to do was to make sure they could get past them unharmed.

Eventually, Rareth did find the light at the end of the tunnel. Literally, in this case. The stream flowed out of the far side of the mountain into another waterfall overlooking an expansive valley. The beacon in the distance still illuminated the area and provided some clue of how much farther they needed to go. She did expect that there could be some difficulty climbing down this side of the mountain, but it was not an unreasonable path, and it would still be much quicker than trying to go around. She saw evidence of nests nearby on the cliffs, but hopefully whatever created them would not prove to be a hindrance. In any case, Rareth did not linger long. Once she confirmed the path through the mountain, she turned back right away to return straight to camp and make her report.