The passageway was circular, four meters in diameter, its cyan-shaded walls made from something resembling fluorescent cotton candy. Dellian floated down its empty center, his armor suit’s thrusters firing almost constantly to keep his course steady. Four of his combat cohort clawed their way along in front. As they were in zero gee, they’d linced additional segments around their core to form a segmented oval shape wrapped in a shell of energy and kinetic armor, which bristled with tri-segment arms. Their gripper talons tore long rents in the corridor’s glowing organic fibers. The remaining two from the cohort were tail-end-charlies, bringing up the rear, alert for any enemy soldiers creeping up.

What Dellian assumed to be nutrient fluid squirted out of each wound the cohort’s talons inflicted, filling the passageway with clouds of shimmering drops—a glow that slowly faded as they merged into larger globules. He batted them away. Suit sensors ran compositional analysis. It wasn’t a bioweapon.

“Another fifty meters, then take the third branch, coord, seven-B-nine,” Tilliana told him.

“Got it.”

“Any sign of hostiles yet?”

“No.”

“There has to be something there to defend the asteroid.”

“I’m looking.” Which was almost true. He’d been relying on the cohort to scan the passageway. That’s complacent. The cohort picked up on his mild anxiety, the way his eyes changed focus to watch the sensor data splash a little more attentively. The two following him immediately released a swarm of dronebugs. They slid through the thin nitrogen atmosphere, as agile as the terrestrial wasps they were modeled on, dodging the oscillating blobs of fluid, their sensors scanning the weird organic walls for any changes.

“Light level is decreasing behind,” his suit announced. “Three percent down.”

Dellian checked his squad display, seeing the platoon locations. They were sticking to formation, all of them snaking their way along the fluffy passageways that wound their erratic way through this section of the asteroid city. Their target was a large central chamber that earlier drone sweeps had discovered, containing a negative energy loop. Command had assigned the squad an infiltration mission to discover the nature of the loop and destroy it. Tilliana and Ellici had split them up, allowing a greater probability that one of them would make it through.

“Janc. Hey, Janc,” Dellian called. “What’s your light level? I’ve got a reduction here.”

“I’ll check.”