Hive mind Beyond the veil

The war was finished in all but name. This final push would seal the fate of the last surviving elements of Aegirarch's expedition.

Across the planet, I was scouring what remained hunting isolated pockets of resistance, There were numerous shattered clone groups hiding in several locations, and most would die out soon without adequate food and water.

Most clone remnants were broken, scattered, and starving. Low on ammo with no support. Yet when cornered, they still fought like zealots—or simply enacted coordinated self-termination protocols. Any functioning facility they retreated from was destroyed before desertion, adding another irradiated zone to the planet.

Now, only one bastion remained—their central command, carved into the bones of a mountain.

Where Aegirarch would meet his end.

I watched that mountain through dozens of eyes. The whole area echoed with the clones' last creed—broadcast over loudspeakers mounted to the cliffs, droning endlessly for all to hear.

"We are the Overseer's warriors.

We are the last line of defence.

We will burn our own to hold the line."

The fortress city had once been a temple, built by an extinct sect whose worship revolved around celestial tides and the luminous stone they mined: Nullite. The Council had purged the religion centuries ago and seized the mountain for its mineral wealth. Now it served another purpose—the last refuge of a dying army.

The city itself was a multi-tiered monolith carved into the cliffside. Shell-like domes protruded from the upper levels, once places of prayer, now command turrets.

Great circular terraces, decorated with fractal carvings, had been refitted with artillery. Concrete bunkers sprouted from every elevation. The old temple walls had been reinforced with some form of synthetic concrete and embedded drone clusters.

Trenches and kill zones spider-webbed the valley below. Rail gun turrets and drone-linked auto-targets created overlapping fields of fire that chewed through most probing attacks. Any attempt to breach from above was met with dense flak and pinpoint laser fire that shredded even reinforced Mosquito wings.

It was the perfect opportunity to test future siege tactics that could be refined against enemies like this in the future. Entrenched, dogged, and utterly suicidal. I could have reduced the fortress to molten ruin with orbital acid and plasma strikes and hunted the survivors, but war is rarely so simple.

Advantages shift and certainties unravel. I needed to understand how to win when brute force wasn't enough.

I deployed hundreds of thousands of Burrowers to begin their operation, digging and reinforcing the tunnels as they went, preparing breach points into the fortress.

At the same time, I flooded the outer trench lines with waves of expendable Beetles, forcing the enemy to expend munitions to survive. If they didn't shoot, they exploded. If they did, they wasted precious rounds.

To maintain pressure, I deployed a new variant: the Heavy Hexapod. Its enlarged frame, and reinforced and extended limbs allowed for greater artillery stability and significantly increased its operational range, making it ideal for sustained long-distance bombardment.

Dozens of them established siege batteries and rotated firing positions, volleying constantly into key defensive positions before moving again.

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Even then, air superiority was contested. The clones had fortified their anti-air grid with dozens of laser nests and automated flak banks. It was difficult to push heavier units through without catastrophic losses.

"You could win this by dropping it all on his head," Seer said, leaning over the tactical display beside me in the command chamber.

"I could," I replied. "But this is a rare chance to test victory over a deeply fortified structure with overlapping fire corridors and networked AI support. Lessons must be learned."

Seer shrugged. "In future wars, you'll outnumber them three-to-one anyway."

"True," I said. "But that doesn't make them less valuable as a case study."

He gestured to a flashing cluster of symbols on the map. "Any luck breaching the interior?"

"Not yet. They've sealed the tunnels tight. My Burrowers are nearly in place to open flanking chambers. I'm also preparing to test a secondary approach."

Seer arched a brow. "Such as?"

"Biological deployment. Disease."

His expression didn't change. "Make it quick."

"It's a paralytic agent. Non-lethal at first. It incapacitates, slows neural activity, and renders the target vulnerable. Memory extraction is more effective that way."

He nodded once and turned back to his interface.

I issued the command.

The first wave of carrier missiles launched from orbit. They detonated in high-altitude arcs above the mountain, releasing thick clouds of engineered fog. A momentary pause settled across the battlefield—then, within the haze, the swarm descended.

Trillions of engineered insects.

They moved like smoke, and were voracious, targeting exposed skin and armour breaches. Their bodies were small, six-limbed, winged—each one equipped with a sac of paralytic disease. Their jaws were razor-edged lined with acid sacs, designed to slice into weak points and deliver their infectious payload.

Screams started to drown out some areas of the battlefield.

They were helpless against my latest tactic.

My insects swarmed individual clones, latching onto them and tearing through their armour with precision bites. As they frantically tried to swat them away, the sheer volume of the swarm choked their vision, turning confusion into panic.

The outer defences began to fall apart as control networks were disabled and clone coordination broke under the onslaught.

Some fought back—flamethrowers surged in rings of fire, incinerating vast portions of the swarm. Others, realizing the inevitable, enacted suicide protocols.

I capitalized immediately.

Swarms of Beetles moved in behind the weakened perimeter, detonating at breached positions. I reinforced them with Assault Drones, breaching their entrenched positions in waves. Snipers positioned behind firing ridges picked off retreating clones. Heavies charged broken trenches, smashing through bunkers and pushing aside flaming wreckage.

Infiltrators slipped through the smoke, targeting commanders and communication nodes, adding to the chaos. The clones fought like the damned, but their coordination was unravelling.

I noted several drone wings attempted fallback manoeuvres—covering clone units as they retreated toward inner corridors. They were outnumbered. Beetles overwhelmed them mid-transition, tearing through their formation and severing their command uplinks.

And still, the clones held the inner line.

They abandoned forward positions, left behind the wounded and dying, and detonated various sections of the mountain to collapse tunnels and stall my advance.

The rubble choked several of my breeches—but not all. The Burrowers were almost through. Many were within metres of the interior sanctum.

When I entered, it would be close quarters, it would be brutal, and bloody for the enemy.

I would flood the lower levels with beetles. Let the mountain itself become a tomb of molten steel and ash.

Their creed would echo through the halls one last time before silence took it forever.

———

The flooded command chamber pulsed with flickering lights—dozens of screens reflected the chaos beyond the mountain. One by one, the displays shifted, cycling to the next critical point on the battlefield.

The central feed focused and enhanced, scanning the vast enemy forces gathering beyond his perimeter.

Aegirarch studied the numbers.

Millions…

Outnumbered a million to one. Orbital supremacy in the abomination's hands. And yet—it still refused to finish him quickly. Was it testing him? Probing his decisions? Or simply toying with him, like a predator playing with its prey?

His V.I. beeped sharply, snapping him from the thought. One screen zoomed in on the latest assault vector—waves of drones and insectoid horrors crashing into the remnants of his outer lines. The new tactic had succeeded in breaking clone coordination completely.

The drones still held their ground, buying seconds with their lives, but the enemy was relentless. Every second brought more numbers against his dwindling defence.

Aegirarch issued a silent command.

"Pull up the seismic feeds."

The data spilled across the screens. Reports of continuous tremors and vibration patterns indicated movement beneath the earth.

All of this chaos above was a distraction.

The real threat was tunnelling straight beneath him.

His jaw clenched.

"No more games," he muttered. "Detonate the last of our nuclear stockpiles. Pull all remaining clone units from the lower levels. Have the machines reinforce expected kill zones."

CONFIRMED.

FINAL DETONATION SEQUENCE ACTIVE.

REINFORCEMENTS REDIRECTED TO INNER LEVELS.

He swarm toward his exo-suit. Hydraulic locks hissed open, and mechanical arms encased him piece by piece in composite plating scorched from previous campaigns.

As the final seals locked into place, the screens erupted in light.

The battlefield outside vanished beneath a wall of nuclear fire. Dozens of detonations thundered in near unison—shockwaves rippling through the valley, tearing apart insect swarms, drones, defensive walls, and even the terrain itself. The air boiled. The water receded under the force of the blast.

Ash and flame swallowed the horizon.

His V.I. reported confirmation.

> AREA CLEANSED. TACTICAL FIELD STABILISING.

He reached down, lifted his weapon from the armour cradle, and checked the charge. Then, with quiet resolve, he stepped forward.

"It's time," he whispered.

And prepared to meet the final wave.