Why couldn’t he at least have thought of closing his visor before diving in after Sterling? August’s rash maneuver had sent him face-first through the moist membrane and onto a slimy ground made from the same tissue as what pulsated on the wall outside. The only difference was that the tissue that blanketed the interior walls, floor, and ceiling was a more vibrant pink, and it glistened. These observations were only possible thanks to his flashlight. Otherwise, there was only darkness.

He spat out a mouthful of clear, salty goo and nearly retched. He mustered as much saliva as he could and continued spitting well after the last of the salty flavor was gone. A strange stench like rot sprinkled with ground peppercorns filled the heavy humid air. His chest heaved again, but he managed to keep it down.

August slammed his face shield down, hoping that would be enough to deal with the smell, and got to his feet. The ground was squishy and oddly pleasant to stand on. He scanned the room with his eyes and the light at the end of the skybeam.

The entrance to the hive opened up into a large, empty room. What is this, some sort of dolo foyer? Before him were three tunnels. Each looked identical, and neither provided any distinctions that might help with which direction to choose.

Sterling’s labored cry struggled up the tunnel on the left. It echoed on the wet walls, distorting it a little, but August was sure it was Sterling. Who else could it be? He started down the tunnel but halted a few strides in. The others. They’ll be coming in after me, and if I’m nowhere to be found, they might take the wrong tunnel.

He was torn between hurrying to help Sterling as fast as possible or waiting to make sure the rest of the squad didn’t find themselves in an even worse mess. This is why Wolf wanted you to stay put.

A blinding light filled the main room and a few yards of the tunnels, revealing the tissue walls' vivid pinks and gunk-coated finish. General Wolf poured in. He landed on his shoulders but rolled impressively to his feet. Wolf raised his face shield, winced at the horrid stench, but took a few breaths before lowering the shield again. He turned to the entrance and shouted, “clear.”

Farscout followed. The guide landed on his shoulder just as Wolf had, but his recovery was significantly clumsier. Dalton West strode in next, as confident and self-assured as the characters he played in the movies. A short while passed before Belmont finally scrambled in. Her white eyes bulged behind her lowered visor.

Hilde stayed behind as she’d agreed to do. Oh no… I never even said goodbye to her. If anything happens…

“Don’t you ever pull anything like that again!” General Wolf kept his voice at a whisper, but it was a harsh one. He stifled a deep cough and took another heavy step toward the private.

August raised his hands in surrender. “I’m sorry, General, but it’s a good thing I did.”

Wolf glared at him with a ‘this better be good’ expression on his face.

“I got in just in time to hear Sterling scream. It’s the only reason I’m so sure this is the right tunnel to take.”

Wolf nodded. “You’ll have to be punished for defying my order, but I do concede that your antics have raised our chances of picking the right tunnel from thirty-three percent to about ninety-nine point nine.”

“Not a hundred?” West chimed in.

Wolf shrugged. “You never know.”

“Oh my God,” Belmont grimaced in her helmet. “That smell…” She’d opened the shield but closed it not a second later.

They all looked at Farscout, who was the only member of the group who lacked a face shield, or a helmet, for that matter. General Wolf put a hand on his shoulder. “You can go back if the smell is too pungent. No one will judge you for that decision.”

Farscout shook his head. His face twitched as if he were holding back a stream of vomit, but he stared down the correct tunnel and tried to act as if he were unfazed. “I’ve smelled worse.”

Wolf eyed the young man a moment, then started down the tunnel.

“How much opposition should we expect here?” Dalton West asked.

“I’m not sure,” Wolf said. “Sterling knows more about these bastards than any of us, but I do remember learning that dolo rarely spend time in their nests. They’re usually out hunting or patrolling and only come to the nest to mate. Based on what the academy taught me, it’s likely we only encounter larvae and the queen.”

“Then what the Hel were those tentacles that pulled Sterling in?” Belmont asked.

“I’ve shared everything I know, sadly,” Wolf said. “From this point on, the five of us are equal in terms of knowledge. Unless our guide here has any more to share.”

“Afraid not,” Farscout said with the front of his shirt pulled over his nose.

They proceeded forward for a few wordless minutes. Sterling didn’t screamed again, and their never-changing surroundings gave the illusion that no progress was made.

Dalton West got down on one knee. “Check this out.”

The party halted and gave him their attention.

“I’ve been looking at the slime on the ground, or floor, whatever you want to call it, and every once in a while, I notice a patch like this one.” He pointed his light close to the ground just before him. “Notice the sort of ruts in the otherwise even slime? I’ve seen this a few times. Each patch is a different size, but I think they might be the spots where Sterling managed to struggle out of the grasp of the tentacle. He never got free for too long, though. Judging by the distance between each patch of disturbed gunk, I don’t think he even managed a single step anytime he got free of the hold.”

“Good work, West,” Wolf said. “Let’s hope he’s still fighting.”

Belmont forced a chuckle from her worried face. “We know he is.”

They continued at a determined pace until the tunnel opened up into another room about three times the size of the dolo foyer. The party looked around in wonder. Farscout even let his nose pluck out from his shirt so that he could fully take in the immensity of the place.

The left and right walls were lined with millions of tiny, bright yellow egg sacs. Each one pulsated at its own pace, creating an unsettling sense of chaos. One massive sac stood before each wall of eggs. The translucent membrane walls were an odd yellow, and their contents were barely visible and swirled around the tanks like the poison in Sterling’s gun. Some type of hose connected the tanks to the egg walls.

Dried dolo husks piled beside both tanks. Only the gathering types who August had seen sucking propane straight from the tank were present in the piles. Farscout had called them Worker Bees. They bring gas to this place and then die?

Muffled moans caused every flashlight to converge at a point on the wall ahead of them. Colonel Trent Sterling was stuck to the wall about fifteen feet off the floor. He was held there by thick mucus-like tendrils that were strong enough to act as rope.

“We’re gonna get you down, Colonel,” Wolf said.

There was a sense of relief among the squad. Sterling was alive. They weren’t out of the woods yet, but it was encouraging. Sterling thrashed about in his restraints. He was trying to shout something, but a film of thick mucus-covered his mouth.

Wolf spun with his gun ready. “We’re not alone. Whatever dragged him down is still here with us.” He raised his voice. “Is that what you’re trying to tell us, Colonel?”

Sterling nodded with wide eyes. His gun, armor, poison tank, and other equipment lay in an eerily neat pile below his feet. They stripped him? I’m surprised they could even think of doing that. Why did they do it?

“Alright,” Wolf said after a bit of thought. “I’m climbing up there to help Sterling. You guys just blow the Hel out of whatever you see, got it?”

The squad members said “Yes, Sir,” in unison, and Farscout repeated, “got it.”

Wolf moved to the wall just to the side of Sterling’s equipment and began to climb. He kicked his foot into the mushy tissue, clawed at the wall for a good grip, and pulled himself up. He couldn’t find purchase in the slime, and he slid to the floor immediately.

The general spat a curse, got back to his feet and drew a knife. He kicked his foot in again, and instead of clawing with his hands this time, he jammed the blade deep into the thick tissue. A loud painful wailing rattled the room. It came from no clear direction as if it were the air itself making the sound. Farscout fell to his knees with his hands over his ears. The others were able to withstand the horrible noise thanks to the helmets.

The guide was back on his feet in a hurry once he heard the startled cries of the squad around him. The monster who’d harassed them above ground—the one that launched Hilde like a chew toy—emerged from behind one of the gas tanks.

“Impossible!” August shouted. “We should have seen it! There’s no way it could have been hiding there.”

“Worry about that later,” Belmont barked. “Look!”

The massive dolo, who August now suspected might’ve been the queen of the hive, was making a B-line straight for General Wolf. August aimed the skybeam and fired at the creature’s face. He missed by an inch, and the rock-hard carapace absorbed the beam of energy.

“Careful where you shoot,” West readied his sniper rifle. “Those gas tanks will blow, especially if hit with energy beams. I’m not sure about your bullets, Farscout. Might just puncture the membrane, but that comes with its own set of problems.”

Each group member, including Farscout, fired a couple more times at the monster, but each attempt was useless. The dolo paid them no mind and was set on reaching Wolf and Sterling. It jumped. The impact of the action sent ripples through the soft floor.

Wolf had only made it a few feet closer to Sterling. He’d never get there in time at the rate the monster was going. “Get this thing off of me, soldiers!” He ordered.

They aimed, but none of them wanted to risk firing in the general direction of Wolf and Sterling. “What do we do?” Farscout asked.

The monster landed near Sterling’s equipment, disturbing the neat pile, and creating another ripple in the floor. It stood on its hind leg, raised a foreleg, and thrust it forward. The point of the leg pierced Wolf’s leg, armor and all. The general shouted a string of curses as the sharp leg pinned him to the wall. The squad watched, useless and unwilling to risk missing their shot. Not that an accurate shot could do much anyway.

The dolo climbed a bit and opened its maw.

“It’s gonna eat him!” Belmont shrieked with bulging eyes. She aimed her pistol, but West put a gentle hand on her wrists.

“What if you miss?”

“What if I don’t?”

West cursed and punched the air in frustration. “There’s nothing we can do. Come on, people. We have to think of something!”

The dolo pulled itself upward. Its gaping maw closed in on the general. Wolf drew a pistol and aimed into the monster’s mouth. He fired. The creature recoiled and thrashed on the floor in a panicked trance, sending dozens of ripples along the pink, glistening floor. It growled and screeched in pain. Wolf was free for now. A trail of blood ran from his leg and down the wall. The blood coasted over the mucus-like water on oil.

The general continued his climb, despite the pain.

Ripples died out as the frantic thrashing of the bug ceased. It wasn’t done with the general yet. August sprinted around the massive bug, who was already en route to the general. He ran by the monster’s skittering legs, far too close for comfort. He shouted, flailed his arms, and even fired his rifle at the bug’s backside, but nothing could take its attention away from the climbing general.

It reached the wall again, got on its hind legs, and thrust forward with the foreleg just like last time. August fired, desperate to save the general. The skybeam’s incandescent projectile cooked through the middle joint of the monster’s raised foreleg. Flesh sizzled, and the bottom half of the leg plummeted to a soft landing on the floor. Acid blood spurted from the wound and hissed on the walls near Wolf and Sterling but missed both men.

The dolo fell back again and thrashed some more. It stilled itself abruptly, stiffened its stance, and bellowed a nasty cry into the air. Farscout fell with his hands on his ears again, and even the helmeted squad members put their hands over the tiny ear holes. The cry died out but did not leave them in complete silence.

Buzzing came from all three tunnels. Everyone looked to the entrances to the room in horror—even Wolf had stalled his climb for a worried glance. The buzzing was quiet until it wasn’t. Each tunnel poured five flyers into the room in a sudden explosion of noise and chaos. They were the same types of dolo that had stuck August in the leg on the first night in the wilderness.

August stepped forward. “I’ll handle the big one. You guys take care of these.”

They all nodded despite him being beneath Belmont and West in rank.

Dalton West dashed for one of the gas tanks and used the piled worker bee husks as cover. He rested the massive barrel of his sniper rifle on one of the husks and began firing. Belmont and Farscout ran around like headless chickens, firing pistol and vintage rifle at random but mostly trying to avoid stingers.

August started for them, but the massive dolo began to stir. It got back to what was left of its feet and rushed for Wolf again. He looked up and was pleased to find that the general had made it to Sterling and was in the process of cutting him loose.

The monster ran past August so close and so fast that he could feel the current of hot wind in its wake. August spun, aimed carefully at the moving legs, and fired. Miss. The legs were a much harder target to hit, but at least the bastard wasn’t invincible as he’d previously thought. He’d have to wait for it to be stationary.

He didn’t have to wait long. The dolo rose to its hind legs again and brought the left foreleg up this time. It looked no less menacing than the one August had blown off. The monster took aim and thrust the leg toward Wolf. The general didn’t even spare the beast a glance, choosing to allocate his focus to freeing Sterling instead. Wolf trusts me. Wolf’s counting on me. I can’t mess this up. I’ve messed up enough already.

He closed one eye and peered through the skybeam’s iron sights. He took a deep breath to drown out the chaos of the battle to his left as much as he could. If Wolf trusted him enough to keep working on Sterling, August would have to trust the others enough to handle the flyers.

The monster’s leg flew forward. August waited, then fired. The beam went hurtling just past a gas tank and into a wall, popping and melting about fifty eggs. I missed!

Something hissed nearby. He looked away from the sizzling eggs and saw a splash of acidic blood smoking on the pink wall just beneath Sterling’s dangling feet. The monster retreated again. It still had the foreleg, but it was dangling by a thread. He grinned and looked up at Wolf to gauge his progress.

“Ace!” Dalton West’s voice cut through the warm, dank air. He’d never heard the sniper sound so frantic. “Thin this herd out a bit!”

August turned to find Belmont and Farscout overwhelmed by the flyers. The dive bombs were coming so fast and so frequently, giving them no time to recover from dodging the last one before they had to worry about the next one. They couldn’t maintain this pace forever. It wouldn’t be long before one of them made a single false move due to fatigue or a simple miscalculation, and that would be the end.

There was only so much West could do with his slow-loading sniper rifle. August took one more glance at the queen and found her floundering in pain. Wolf shouted down at him. “Go help them!”

August sprinted ahead to reinforce Belmont and Farscout. He stood firm in the middle of the room, acting as bait, and got three quick kills as the foolish bugs dove straight for him. There was a time when I was scared of you little shits. Feels like a long time ago now.

He turned to check on his comrades. Farscout was looking at him with a relieved smile. A dolo was closing in on him fast from behind. August couldn’t even open his mouth to shout a warning in time. The dolo was coming in stinger first. The guide’s thick denim wouldn’t stand a chance.

Lines of sticky acid blood spurted from the dolo. It continued forward but soared over Farscout’s head and went crashing into the wall between two tunnels. Belmont knelt nearby with a smoking pistol and a smirk.

The last remaining flyer dove at Belmont. August raised his rifle, but a fat beam of energy pierced the creature’s body before August could pull the trigger. Dalton West leaned the heavy sniper rifle on his shoulder and left the cover of the husks.

There was no time to celebrate. The four victors hurried to rejoin Wolf and Sterling, but they were too late. The queen climbed at an absurd speed despite its missing or injured appendages. She’d already reached Wolf before anyone had the time to react. She raised the right middle leg while the others clung to the wall, and she pushed it through the general’s chest.

August screamed something that started out as “no” but ended as a mindless call of battle. His throat rasped from the efforts of his cry, and it was even enough to get the monster’s attention. She extracted the leg and crawled down the wall as Wolf’s motionless form plummeted to the floor.

The falling body landed with a sickly thud. August ran for it while the others shouted orders for him to wait. “Aim for her legs!” August called back and continued running.

He reached Wolf and slid to his knees. He picked up the general’s heavy head, removed the helmet, and cradled him. Wolf coughed. He wasn’t dead!

The general opened his eyes slowly, coughed again, “Ace?”

“I’m here, General,” August said. “You’re alright. We’re gonna get you out of here, alright?”

Wolf donned a faint smile. “You’re going to be one hel of a soldier, son.”

A tear trickled down August’s cheek. Wolf stared at it, fascinated. “Hang in there, General. We’ve just gotta deal with the queen, and then we’re out of here. Can you do that? Can you hang in there just a bit longer?”

Wolf chuckled and spat a glob of blood. “You’re so similar to how I was at your age.” He brought a hand up and let it drop onto August’s shoulder. His face took on a serious expression. “No matter what anyone ever tells you…” He coughed. “You’re a real soldier. You’re all man, too, got it?”

Tears streamed freely now, but August refused to weep. Weeping felt like acceptance somehow, like as long as he could hold it back, there was a chance Wolf could survive.

“Heads up!” West shouted.

The queen was close—her gaping maw made no secret of her intentions. A blinding beam chopped one of her middle legs off. She screeched but did not stop. The monster continued its advance. August held a hand out, calling for his squadmates to hold their fire.

He aimed and waited. His hands were trembling, but luckily his shot wouldn’t have to be as precise as when aiming for the legs. The monster pounced like a cat. The gaping maw came at him and grew as the dolo unhinged its mandible further.

August pulled the trigger. The skybeam whirred and blasted. The short energy beam entered the monster’s maw and exited through the meat beneath the raised carapace that shielded the wings. The dolo landed a few feet away from August and Wolf. It spat a stream of acid and screeched in pain. August got to his feet and pulled the general away from the pooling, hissing blood.

The dolo squealed and whimpered as it struggled toward the nearest gas tank. It latched its maw onto a strange nozzle near the floor and began to suckle at the gas. The same sickening sound that the worker bees had made outside emanated from the queen now, just ten times louder.

The party stared in disgust. Farscout lurched to the side and hurled onto the pile of husks beside the other tank.

Trent Sterling landed hard on his back. The progress made by Wolf must’ve been enough to allow Sterling to struggle the rest of the way out. West rushed forward and helped the exterminator to his feet. The dolo had left him his underclothes, but everything else was in a pile nearby.

He retrieved his equipment and donned his armor. He left his poison gun on the floor and instead drew his pistol.

“What are you doing?” West asked. “Go poison that monster!”

Sterling laughed and waved a dismissing hand. “I spray that in here, we all choke. Those without helmets likely die.”

Farscout returned to the squad, frowning with the eyes of a sick pup. “I’m sorry, guys. The general was right. I should have stayed back.”

“Oh my God, look!” Belmont pointed toward the gas tank.

The queen had been suckling the gas long enough that some of her wounds were beginning to regenerate.

“How the fuck are we supposed to kill this thing?” August shouted, still holding Wolf’s limp head.

Sterling looked around the room, smirked, and swiped Farscout’s vintage rifle. “You’re a lot more useful than you know, kid.” He playfully messed up the scout's black hair before turning away with the gun.

“It’s ineffective,” West said in a somber voice.

“No shit,” Sterling said but aimed and fired anyway. The bullet punctured the gas tank’s membrane, creating a leak. He turned swiftly and did the same to the other.

“What the Hel is wrong with you?” West grabbed the exterminator by the shoulder straps.

Sterling shook out of the old sniper’s grip and casually returned the rifle to Farscout. He returned to his exterminator’s gun on the floor but never picked it up.

Wolf let out another deep cough and more blood spattered from his mouth. “Belmont!” August cried.

The medic snapped to attention and hurried over. So much had been going on that it was easy to forget one’s role. She gently nudged August aside and took over.

Sterling leaned against the wall where he’d been restrained not five minutes earlier and loitered there like some common thug.

“If you’ve got a plan, now would be a good time to share it,” West said.

Sterling reached into his breast pocket and fished out a cigarette. “My last smoke.” He winked at August.

August took a decisive step toward the exterminator. “You better not be thinking… There’s got to be another way! Let’s just think about this for a second.”

Sterling glanced at the suckling queen. “We don’t have many seconds. The bitch is almost fully regenerated. You guys get the general out of here.”

“We can’t just let you die,” August pleaded. “Did that mucus mess with your head or something?”

“Oh, come on, kid, clue in,” Sterling rolled his eyes as he spoke. “There’s nothing waiting for us back at the dome. If I’m gonna die regardless, I might as well look like a total badass while doing it.”

“I won’t let you!” August could barely hold back the emotion now. First Wolf, now this, not to mention Hilde being alone outside.

“Kid, you’ve got your whole life ahead of you,” Sterling said. “Well… that is, as long as you don’t go back to the dome. Head over to Gardewall. You can make it work there. I’m sure Beth will let you guys in, eh Farscout?”

Farscout nodded. “Of course she wi—”

“Trent, enough of this shit,” Belmont snapped at him like an angry mother. “You’re getting out of here with us. Let that thing suck all the gas it wants.”

“We came here to torch the nest, Luna,” Sterling said. “That’s what I’m doing. Friends… I’m striking this match once this room fills with enough gas whether you’re in here or not. You might as well get as far away from here as you can while you can.” He eyed both tanks. “This much gas…” He forced a chuckle. “It’s gonna be a Hel of a blow. Don’t worry about me,” he smiled. “I’m the asshole, remember?”

The others were silent. August debated incapacitating the exterminator somehow and forcefully pulling him out of the nest.

“Trust me, guys,” Sterling said. “I can’t think of a better death than to bring this whole nest and that monster there with me.”

Dalton West nodded, almost as if he understood the exterminator’s horrible plan. “Alright. Let’s hurry up and get out of here, then. Colonel Trent Sterling, it’s been a privilege to serve with you all these years.”

“All these years,” Sterling scoffed. “You were out getting pampered and making movies for most of my career.”

West laughed. “Can’t even die without a final jab, huh?”

Sterling winked.

West tapped Farscout on the arm and signaled for him to follow. West crouched beside Wolf and asked Belmont, “Is he stable?”

Belmont wiped the tears from her eyes and nodded.

West hoisted the general’s shoulders, and Farscout grabbed the legs. It took them a few steps to get used to handling the awkwardly distributed weight, but they were chugging forward smoothly by the time they reached the mouth of the tunnel.

Belmont hesitated. Her shoulders sagged when she realized there was nothing she could do to change Sterling’s mind. She went over and kissed her longtime comrade on the cheek. Sterling smiled. Belmont crouched, picked up Sterling’s empty pack of smokes, turned away, and headed for the tunnel, sobbing along the way.

August refused to move.

“Get out of here, kid,” Sterling said. “You’ve got more to live for out there than any of us.”

He stayed silent and let the tears flow. He knew what Sterling meant by that, but he played dumb.

“She loves you,” Sterling said. “I’ve never seen Rosek act around anyone else the way she acts with you. I know it might be hard to tell, but trust me, she’s usually much colder and sterner.” Sterling grinned. “And you love her too. That much is obvious. Why wouldn’t you, right? Go on, now. Get on out of here. When the two of you are living in a peaceful home, wherever that may be, and she’s pushed out a couple of kids…” his confident expression wavered slightly for the first time. “Just promise you’ll think of me, eh?”

“I will,” August’s voice was feeble like a child’s. “I promise.”

Sterling smiled. The corner of his eye glistened, but a quick swipe of a thumb ended that.

The disturbing suckling noises cut out abruptly.

The two soldiers glared at the queen. She was fully regenerated as if none of her wounds had ever happened. Even the legs that had been blown off completely were back and functioning.

“Get out of here!” Sterling shouted the order as he drew a match from his pocket.

The sight of it sank August’s heart, but he nodded and ran for the tunnel. He glanced back one more time before entering the dark corridor. Tears streamed freely down the exterminator’s face as he stood watching the encroaching queen, unlit smoke in one hand, match in the other.

August turned away, reluctantly, and ran down the tunnel as fast as he could, leaving Colonel Trent Sterling alone to enjoy his last cigarette.