Suggested rating: ages 15+ due to Gratuitous violence.

Bold sections are Rick musing over and explaining his trap in a much earlier time. (For those who miss Rick)

Day 80

“Now you're probably wondering what traps I've put out there, Niala.” Rick said over a month earlier, showing off his newest and deadliest toy. He said this in rat native language to avoid being understood by the newly adopted feline humanoids. He wasn't quite sure he trusted them yet and wanted to give Niala some additional defenses.

“Gather some scouts and small men, if we can't smoke them out then we'll use the traps we know the weaknesses of to enter.” [General]

*The thing is it's kinda hard to explain exactly what I did out there...

“When you see the chest-high blades again, send a squad in, crawling.” [General]

“Yes sir!” [Ape Commanders]

*Because really it isn't just one or two traps...

“Wait for it...” [Ape Spear Leader]

…

The scout sent in crawled down the tunnel on his belly, down the thin channel between the corpses that line the cave walls. Every few feet he glanced around, seeing lines and patterns in the wall that grew more unnerving the further he crawled.

“Don't kill me, don't kill me, don't...” He muttered endlessly as he crawled. He had seen the jaw trap kill his buddy the other day and fully expected it to happen again.

"You see it is actually two entirely different defense systems built over each other. Normally it is set to non-lethal and armed for single targets and small groups... you see this switch here? Yes this one. You should never pull it..."

However the jaws never came, instead, to the absolute relief of the scout the same two blades came out that so devastated the initial attempt to enter.

The ape spear commander immediately ordered his squad to enter the tunnel and crawl for the door.

"...unless there is a really dangerous monster or many enemies. If there are things like that, then keep the traps on until they leave... or die".

The men crawled fast, edging closer to the open door with every moment. The sound of bronze and leather scraping on the stone covered every noise, except the whistling sound as huge blades swept overhead.

The entrance, only yesterday seemingly an impossible distance away was close to being traversed.

"... if you leave it running it will not only react to enemy incursion with old tricks, as it also registers whether these tricks are working it can adapt by using variations..."

The blades retracted back into the walls, which made the success seem inevitable. Dozens more poured into the tunnel following at the heels of the advance team now that the traps were useless.

As they crawled the blades extended again, impotently threatening the crawling men.

The General looked pleased, smiling triumphantly.

Then the blades tilted by forty five degrees, before speeding down the tunnel with a '/' -like formation.

A grim frown grew on the General's face immediately replacing his smirk.

"You see the traps are almost alive. I added something like the things I used for the 'brains' of the golems. The traps will even recognize people you consider to be friends and avoid them if you tell it to. Naturally this includes the golems."

The screams and the sound of bodies slashed apart was only a few tragic

moments long.

The ape spear commander wincing at the sudden reversal and the horrid noise.

As the soldiers watched the tunnel, now choked by the dead the floor lifted at the gate entrance.

The General paused, stunned at the sight.

As the floor rose higher and higher to the ceiling, bodies slid out of the tunnel; tumbling to a halt at the entrance. It was as if the tunnel was spitting them out, with disgust.

"It has a self cleaning function, so no matter what; the traps and tunnel will be clear to pass."

The corpses were retrieved and thrown carelessly into a pile several feet away from the tunnel mouth.

The General stood there looking at the tunnel.

He understood now how dangerous this thing was. Seeing this monstrous invention at work, he was actually feeling uneasy.

His thoughts asked only a single question: “What are we really trying to fight here?”

He called a halt. It was clear to him now, this tunnel was demonic in nature. It had been leading them around by the nose, anticipating their attempts to defeat it.

"And when the trap system realizes it is being anticipated it starts up the second set of tricks. When appropriate. Heh heh..."

Thinking hard about this tunnel the old man eventually came to a conclusion: sending men down the tunnel would only be throwing them to their deaths.

And so he began to plan, issuing orders.

Day 81

"If the enemy is determined enough they will eventually try to attack with unconventional methods. Gasses, poison... maybe reroute a river? So always..."

The soldiers were really not equipped for this kind of thing.

The spear commander ape was already bemoaning his currently awful job. Normally his purpose in battle and siege was to act as a physical barrier with his men, to hold an enemy in place until the heavy infantry and skirmishers could attack them. The skirmishers to harry the enemy from the flank, the heavies to chew the enemy to pieces from the front.

However the enemy in this case was in large part unable or unwilling to fight them. Instead holing up in their den and only raiding to catch the invaders by surprise.

It really annoyed him, this kind of fight. It made his presence unnecessary for anything less than leading a suicidal rush... or rubbish like this job.

He was certain the Shadow-commander of the scout unit didn't get seriously ridiculous orders like this.

"If you look in this flat thing here on the wall you can see what they are doing out there, so you can smash that plan. No it isn't magic... it's using a little thing like a golem I call a camera drone..."

The spear commander and his significantly smaller squad weren't even being used as guards, which was very galling.

Instead they were in charge of the newest assault plan, it was not a glorious one.

“When did we become animal herdsmen?” The ape spear commander asked, behind the unit's forty Gern. Gern were beasts of burden, large and heavy with relentless stamina. Often younger Gern were used by merchant convoys, these ones were mature animals bred for military transportation.

Standing ten foot at the shoulder, these huge animals could drag a cart weighing nearly it's own body weight. They were gentle animals: a rarity in the tunnels, with long tusks for digging roots and a long flexible snout. In appearance an Earthling like Rick would describe them as the mutant offspring of a pig and a tapir... with some rhino thrown in for the body shape. In actuality they were closer in origin to extinct mega-fauna from the Ice Age.

"Don't panic if it seems like the enemy are going to break through..."

The Gern were quickly lashed into a frenzy, stabbed lightly in the haunches and rear by the soldiers trailing them. The beasts had thick skin and docile temperament, but with such massive size and strength the goading was enough to make them afraid: and this meant anything in their way would get crushed. Bellowing in terror the beasts quickly became a stampede as the fear of one spread to the others.

A wall of spears, presented by the soldiers kept the beasts funneled in the correct direction.

The beasts might be harmless under normal circumstances, at the present moment they were quite capable of crashing through a stone wall without slowing.

If a golem of the current generation tried to physically confront the herd, it would be trampled.

This was the General's game, a tactic aimed directly at testing the true capabilities of the tunnel defenses. And it was something even Rick couldn't anticipate.

Yet even so...

"... if the situation turns sour and you are really in danger... this switch here is what you need to pull. You see the defenses aren't quite all..."

Niala already expecting the absolute worst could see how bad the situation was, from the noise and camera transmissions directly fed to her artificial eye.

Without hesitation she had the golem stationed at the switches trigger the final one. The limiter.

Up until now the traps had been in 'reactive mode'. Analyzing and defeating small scale attempts at breach. Because that was all the threat Rick considered a bunch of bronze era enemies would offer.

The herd however was far outside his expectations for the apes or other hostiles he knew of, except perhaps the Giants and monsters.

Unlimited mode was his answer to these thorny, heavy enemies.

He remembered his woes with the Giant Salamander, the Butcher and the Undead Giant all too clearly. So while 'Normal mode' had small numbers of low value threats as a focus and 'Limited mode' was his answer to more aggressive, determined enemies... 'Unlimited mode' was a completely different beast.

It was simply all-out attack, without care for preserving the defenses. And the weapons he had really built were mostly sitting in standby until now. Durability and caution be damned, they all activated. 'Limited mode' only switched them on one by one carefully hiding their true depth. This was when the apes learned a lesson even more bitter than the last few.

They were all sitting inside the true trap.

The entire room they had set camp inside... the core of the trap. The passages leading into it... each one a mouth leading to Hell.

"When this switch is on... the doors stay shut and you cannot leave. This is different from the others, this one doesn't detect friend or foe. It attacks with everything it has anything it senses... and it can sense body heat and foot steps."

The animals charging wildly toward the open door met a tragic and instantaneous fate.

The floor erupting spikes and the walls metal jaws.

The jaws couldn't quite cope with the heavy bones and massive size of the creatures. Only one beast was slain, as it was hit directly in the neck. The combined herd smashed through these barriers. The spikes extending from the floor were slanted, like a barricade used against horsemen. The first few beasts were pushed by those behind onto the spikes, covering and breaking the deadly barricade with their bulk.

Five beasts remained, plowing through the traps that were made for mere men. The beheading blades broke off, embedded in a heavy shoulder. A thick wire pulled at high speed lacerating the head of the lead Gern as it snapped.

Spikes came out from the walls, launched like ballista bolts.

The beasts crumbled. Only one remained, charging in the center of the formation accidentally defended from attack by two of it's kin on each side as the bolts triggered. It entered the open gateway...

As it slammed shut with force so excessive it sheared the beast in two.

Now if the General had been watching this he would have been troubled. However as it was, the current situation was far more delicate for the trapped army.

The connecting tunnel mouths grew spike traps, like the fangs of beasts waiting to gnaw prey to pieces.

The room itself displaying lines along the floor as the mechanisms opened.

Everywhere the cracks triggered: each a deadly and unexpected new horror.

Pitfalls. Blades. Fire. Poison dart volleys embedded in the walls.

It was one thing after another.

A wrong step, a pause at the worst moment: dismemberment, cremation and worse.

Five apes scrambled out of a burning tent... to stumble into a deep pool of viscous fluid and disappear screaming.

Another was impaled by a falling stalagmite.

Several looked up and realized the ultimate terror... the entire roof had opened up above them exposing turning gears and many shining black eyes.

Current Ape Army:

Ape Commanders: 4 (General, Strategist (wounded), Ghost and Lieutenant)

Able Ape Soldiers: 301 Heavy Infantry

243 Spear Hoplites

462 Skirmishers

395 Scouts

Current Fatalities: 1 Commander (Brute)

752 Heavy Infantry

392 Spear Hoplites

153 Skirmishers

354 Scouts (2 to radiation poisoning)

Current Wounded: 156 ranging from light gashes to maiming injuries.

207 of these completely incapable of fighting.

What we learned:

Rick was expecting he would piss off a LOT more than a mere army of apes in the long run.

Yes... he bottled the little black monsters.

Unleash the Swarm!

The various former slaves in the fortress city were thrilled when they suddenly received surprise bacon. The very best kind of bacon.

Sorry the chapter is so late, I've been feeling down lately. I'm over it now.