The days passed quickly for John and his team, as training and patrols took up the majority of their time. Eventually, the day came that they bid farewell to the safety of the current camp area altogether and they set out down the road once more.

A series of shotgun blasts rang out quickly in the early morning. The battle raged on for just under an hour until now. During that harrowing ordeal the Succubuzz swarm continually tried to work their way into the cavern that John and his harem chose as a refuge.

"Dammit!" John hissed irately as he fell back to reload. The longer this battle continued, the worse their position became. Fighting out in the open was impossible. There were simply too many of the overly aggressive girls flying around outside.

Kara took up her position at the cave entrance. The ammunition was almost gone. Even her plasma fire was rapidly running out.

"We're fucked," muttered Mindi as she dabbed a wet cloth over Tera's injuries. Their flight to the cave had occurred just after they broke camp that morning. The Succubuzz swarm appeared out of nowhere, as they tended to do.

Unlike many other insect types the lab created Demi-Human Succubuzz were intelligent enough to catch their prey unaware as opposed to simply swarming them from the beginning. They chose to wait for the exact right moment to unleash their personal brand of hell upon their prey.

Dozens of the horny bee Demi-Humans must have been badly injured, or died, in the first few moments of the confrontation. Still, their numbers remained high.

The team was blocked from reaching their escape vehicle, earlier due to planning on the part of the swarm. The small quarter was herded into a nearby cave during the running gun battle.

Unfortunately, Tera received several brutal stings while they fled. The result left her badly injured and poisoned. None of the crew escaped without injury, however. Even Kara's armor only managed to dull the impact of the occasional dive enhanced assault.

As it stood now they were almost out of standard ammunition and Kara would soon be out of energy for her plasma shots. Mindi needed water to use her ranged attacks properly, and Tera shook violently under the stress of whatever the infernal bitches had injected her with via their tail stingers. John wasn't feeling too hot himself, but he didn't have time to use his magical abilities to detoxify either of them until they could get the swarm to let up.

"Hey, you're a mage right? Why don't you turn them into frogs or something?" asked Mindi hatefully as she tried to clean Tera's wounds with the little bit of water she had left in her bottle. They managed to save the backpack with supplies and ammo since John carried that. Unfortunately, their first aid kit had fallen out during their flight. They saved some water, food, and what was left of their ammo but little else made it to the cave with them.

"Hey you're a water Demi-Human right? Why don't you walk out there and turn into a puddle of shut the hell up?" returned John heatedly. Couldn't the stupid jellyfish see they were busy trying to keep the swarm out of the cave? If he could turn the swarm into frogs or toads, he damned well would have done it by now.

"How dare you! It's your fault we're in this mess!" snapped the Kraken angrily.

John growled at her for a moment then turned away. He had no interest in arguing with a subordinate when he needed to focus on the task at hand. He might have something he could do to help the situation, but he wasn't certain that it would work.

He suspected there were at least forty or fifty of the swarm members still alive and able to fight. His magical skill and knowledge was considerable. His power was not. He had no doubt his father would have simply cast some uber spell of ultimate doom and destroyed them with little fanfare. John had to think tactically instead.

Mindi continued to yell at him from behind as Kara shot at anything that popped its head into the narrow cavern entrance. His musings were not cut short by either of those loud disruptions so much as the sound of gunfire from outside.

The gunfire grew louder and began to be interspersed with the screams of injured or dying succubuzzes. Several minutes passed before the sound of heavy machine guns and the occasional explosion died down.

The group perked up when they heard a bullhorn enhanced voice call out, "Anyone alive in there?"

"Mindi. Go answer the man," instructed John while he finished reloading his shotgun with the last of his shells.

"Why should I do it? You're the tamer!"

"I'm getting tired of your attitude. Do as I say," stated John evenly. He wasn't about to risk his own neck or Kara's if this 'rescue' turned out to be a bunch of bandits.

There was also another reason for his decision. Neither of the girls at the back of the cave had done much in the way of providing help during this tense situation. This was Mindi's chance to rectify that fact in his eyes.

"No," replied the girl in a huff before folding her arms across her chest in defiance.

"Fine," replied the man before tapping the side of his scanner and stating, "Voice command authorization."

Mindi blinked at him, thinking for the moment that she had won the argument. What happened next would prove to discourage such thinking.

"Voice command authorized," replied the device in a feminine tone.

"Disciplinary action requested, control collar three activate," stated John. Mindi's eyes widened in shock as a violent spasm of undiluted pain rippled through her body paralyzing her.

John could have done all of that without the effort to go through vocal authorization. A few taps of his scanner control menu would have done it. He wanted the Demi-Human to know he was doing it. The more willful she was, the less useful she would be in the future. At this point, her actions were actively detrimental to the team. There was no reason to coddle her any further.

As the Kraken's body spasmed on the ground he stood up and told her. "I'll go see if the people with heavy weapons are friendly toward us. You lay there and take a well-deserved rest from all the nothing that you do."

Mindi *urked* and spasmed a few times but other than the trickle of yellow fluid flowing from between her legs and the unmistakable odor coming from her backside there was little in the way of an actual response.