Tamia, Veronica, Christine, and Juan all quickly move to reinforce the backlines just as the Ultimo-Bots are charged by another group of Tunnelers.

A good portion of them are incinerated when they dive into the flames, but the heavier variants manage to break through, jumping onto of a couple robots and beginning to tear them apart. ​​

*Suuchi!*

Afton's Ultra Chainsword bisects a Gargoyle as it tries to slam its claws down onto a downed Ultimo-Bot. He then dodges claws from two other Tunnelers while literally disarming them in the process.

He's forced to duck under a destroyed Ultimo-Bot that'd been thrown by a Gargoyle, but retaliates by thrusting his plant arm towards it and extending his limb like a spear, it turns as hard as steel as it punches through the creature's chest.

This doesn't instantly kill the creature though, so Afton had roots spring out of the spear and into the Gargoyles wound, infesting its body and tearing its organs apart. Once it was dead, he lifts his arm up and throws the beast at one of the charging brute Tunnelers headed right for him.

"Fuck!" he exclaims as it tears its allies corpse apart and continues running though, bringing down a heavy hand towards him. He twists away and easily avoids it, but the stone beneath cracks from the sheer impact.

*SHHOOoo!*

*ROOooaaarr!*

A couple of Ultimo-Bots that weren't locked in battle turn their flame throwers towards the brute, peppering it with bullets while the flame throwers went to work... Unfortunately, the Tunneler Brute's scales were simply too thick to harm this way.

It turns its attention towards the robots, thus giving Afton an easy path to its back... He leaps towards it, his Ultra Chainsword swimming through the air as it carves into its back, cutting upwards until it passes through the brutes neck and skull.

*GUHK!?*

The creature gives a confused grunt as its brain is pierced, its body quickly slumping to the floor, dead. Afton turns his attention to the other Brute currently decimating his Ultimo-Bots and scowls, he shoots a root to the roof and uses it to swing across the cavern, allowing him to drop towards the brute.

*SLASH!*

*Thud!*

Its head falls to the floor not long after, the creature not having noticed Afton's presence before it was too late. With the threat of the brutes finished, he takes a moment to survey the battlefield, silently nodding at how dominant his troops were compared to the frankly desperate-looking Tunnelers.

The Cyberdogs were keeping their distance and firing Sonic Barks to deal with Tunnelers with too much armour, and his companions were dealing with the more resilient variants on the backline. The frontline was basically almost won, as without the brutes to cause tramble the Ultimo-Bots the other Tunnelers stood no chance.

He turns his focus towards the end of the cavern as the smoke begins clearing up, quickly spotting a strange-looking Tunneler that was drastically different from the rest... It was as big as the Gargoyles but clambered around as if drunk, its abdomen was disproportionately bigger than the rest of its body, and its scales were very colourful...

It gives a weak screech as Afton starts running towards it, it tries to escape by burrowing into the stone below, but he just plunges his Plant Arm into the ground, spreading roots that quickly catch his prey.

He pulls it out of the ground kicking and screaming, retraining it as he takes a better look... "Hm. So you're the queen then? You don't look all that royal." he smugly remarks as the creature continues to try and escape capture.

"Whatever." mutters noncommittally before locking all of its limbs in place with a harness made from his arm, afterwards snapping off the connection so it stays in place. He'd bring this creature back to Borous to see what he could make of it... Perhaps the queen held secrets to how they could easily deal with these things. At least, that's what he hoped.

The battle continues for a couple more minutes, the Cyberdogs, Ultimo-Bots, and his Companions exterminating any remaining Tunnelers. After they're all eliminated, he takes samples from each Variant, as well as the egg-sacks stuck around the room before ordering the robots to incinerate the rest.

Once the room is completely cleansed, Afton leads everyone out of the cavern and back up towards the railway. Once they got back up to the surface, they spotted the Deathclaws they'd left behind surrounded by Tunneler corpses...

"Huh... Seems like they're still coming from somewhere... Or maybe these were just out hunting?" Afton questions.

Veronica shrugs, "Who knows... Let's just get back and wash this stuff off, we can always come back later."

*Screeech!*

The group turn around and send dull looks at the still restricted and squirming Tunneler queen. Afton just gestures at his companions, "You guys are free to do what you want, I need to get that thing back to Borous, organise more raids, and collect the destroyed robots and Cyberdogs that're still down there."

"You sure? There isn't something we can do to help?" Juan asks, looking tired despite his sudden eagerness to help out.

Afton shakes his head, "Nah, I got this. Go take a shower, have a drink, you know, the good shit." he states while looking down at the Ultimo-Bots that were still climbing out of the hole.

"Don't mind if I do." Veronica announces as she marches towards the exit while pulling Christine along.

Juan still looks a bit unsure but follows them anyway, the only person left was actually Tamia who was looking past Afton towards the direction directly opposite where Big Mt was.

Afton notices this a minute later and crooks a brow at her, "Something wrong?"

Her body jolts slightly as she hears him, having apparently been deep in thought, "What? Ah, no..." she shakes her head, "I was just thinking, well, not thinking perse... Remembering maybe?" she shakes her head again, "Something about this all feels familiar for some reason. The Tunnelers, cave crawling, even what Christine said about that irradiated military base..."