The entrance of the Omnihive was deceptively simple, eerily disguised as simple cave corridor. Water still dripped, voices still echoed, and the surrounding rocks that built up the walls still remained, although a disgusting stench of rotten meat continued to violate their senses. The cave didn't last long, gradually transitioning into something different entirely. After a couple meters in, a glistening slime began leaking from the walls. Rocky stopped to sniff it, then quickly reared his head back in grimacing disgust. It only increased the further in, starting from droplets only to become full glazes of ooze coating the walls with their vile shine.

No one saw the floor's transformation until Ryder's footsteps turned into sticky, squelching noises, his leather boots pushing down into a pulsing red surface. Being in front, Ryder was grateful no one could see the immensely disturbed look on his face. Rocky already knew it was coming, he'd seen it all before, yet he was completely unprepared as the cavern ran red, the rocks beginning to smoothen out until they formed a flesh-like material. Struggling to keep his composure, Chase trekked on as low vibrations could be felt in the floor and walls, his paws splashed red from the muscley floor he walked on. Marshall had his eyes glued to the red floor, as if he were counting the individual blue veins stringing within it. He utterly refused to look up, following the tracks of Rocky's back legs. The scientist team wasn't even the slightest bit phased, strolling through the wasteland as if they had seen it all millions of times. Paralyzed with shock before the living corridor, Everest couldn't even say a word, her face flaring with horror as she absorbed the sight before her.

"I've seen this," Chase spoke to her, trying to take his mind off the situation at hand.

"What the-" the husky stuttered. "What is all this!?"

"Hive." Ryder called from the front.

"... for what?" Everest gave her partner a fearful glance.

"Well for starters, you don't need to be afraid." Chase said, thinking back on past experiences. "Disturbing as hell in these things, but there's not anything in here that can actually hurt you."

"That we know of." Rocky looked back at him.

"You've been in here before?" The husky shuddered.

"Not this one, the one back at the Lookout." Chase explained, remembering a haunting memory of the basement underneath. "The creature that Dutch let loose, it built a nest exactly like this one under our tower. Whole thing was terrifying to walk around, yet there wasn't actually anything that posed a threat... aside the creature itself, of course."

Ryder scoffed. "Don't be so sure of yourself, Chase, that mess was just a small piece. The Omnihive? It's the whole thing." His voice shivered slightly, "we're walking right into their world, we don't know what's in here."

"You said you've been in there before." The shepherd said aloud, calling to the front of line. "If anyone knows, it should be you."

"Yeah, but not in there!" Ryder argued. "I only ever went into this cave to set up small devices, I never... I never actually walked into the hive itself."

Rocky stared at his old leader, disbelief on his face. "Seriously? You're supposed to be the brave one." When he got no response, the mix whispered under his breath. "Coward."

They approached the end of the living cave, gone were the natural elements that made up the tunnel, now fully transitioned into a repulsive corridor made of muscle and bleeding boils. Strings hung down from the ceiling like tendons, gently tickling their backs as translucent fluid dripped from every surface. The temperature had abnormally risen, creating steaming mist that breathed out of the biomass. Everest was already panting, her thick fur trapped in dangerous amounts of heat. Chase was watching her worriedly, and the husky in the research team was already panting as well. Small electric lanterns previously set up were their only source of light, painting a weak glow along the living tunnel they traveled in. It appeared to be a dead end, a notion of false hope that gave even Ryder a slight wave of relief, until a scientist pointed out a small detail in the wall.

There was some kind of mass in the wall, a four-foot malformed organ made of smooth, tightly held lips of flesh. Putrid liquid bled from its slit, a rancid aroma bubbling through that could be compared to dead fish.

"Oh, lord." Chase covered his nose.

"Ugh-" Ryder recoiled, being the closest. "This is... fucked up."

"Dutch couldn't even give us gas masks?" Came Rocky's gagged words, desperately trying to keep himself from vomiting.

"You have air in there." Dutch's voice came through the radio collars. "You'll live. Didn't take you as a whining puppy, Chase."

The shepherd frowned with an annoyed expression. "Forgot he could hear us."

"Well, no time like the present." Ryder stuck his arms out, plunging his hands into the slit. The organ produced a sickening wheeze in response, irritated at the disturbance. The entire group stepped back with stomach-churning disgust as the boy put his strength forward, slowly spreading apart the two lips of flesh. A tight corridor made of sickly pink was revealed, dripping endlessly with sliming fluid. He was visibly straining from the effort, gritting his teeth and needing a whole foothold just to push it apart. The crackles of broken crusting could be heard around it, flakes of an unknown substance popping off the walls. One of the scientists even picked one up and stored it away, oblivious to Chase's reviled stare. "Hnng-" Ryder grunted, spreading open the crevice until his strength faded out. He stumbled backward with a groan, hunching over to catch his breath. "That's... that's as far it goes."

"Don't tell me we have to crawl through that..." Marshall said, tensed up with fear.

Rocky rolled his eyes, walking forward to the boy's side. "Where else would we go? We're in this now, I don't think it's worth having any expectations." He looked up at Ryder. "Well, dominant species goes first."

"Gee, thanks." Said the mercenary, rolling his eyes as he stepped forward. Taking a deep breath, Ryder kneeled down and reached out to grip the insides of the cavern and pulled himself into it. The dogs watched with squeamish anticipation as he disappeared down the dark, claustrophobic tube. The research workers followed behind, each one stifling their inner phobias and squeezing in after him.

"Are we really doing this?" Marshall winced.

Rocky looked back at his friends, resignation on his face. "Do you see any other option? We're in this whether we like it or not. Besides, we've been through this before, it shouldn't be that bad."

"Careful what you wish for." Chase warned, briefly looking back at Everest. "Do you think the outpost has any water?"

"Maybe, but probably not much. Is she okay?"

"Fine," Everest heaved.

"She's practically cooking here, Rocky." Chase said, meeting his captain. "Dutch sent us in to die."

"Look, I'll ask one of the researchers if they have water." Rocky nodded, growing concerned over the husky's overheating state. "See you on the other side, I guess." Gulping his fears down, the mix climbed up into the tunnel, pushing his head through the walls of bloodied flesh. His tail disappeared into the darkness, leaving the remaining three alone.

"Do you have any idea how many nightmares I've had?" Marshall whimpered.

"I'm not going in there." Everest mirrored his hesitation, joining the Dalmation at the back of the line. Her underbelly was already caked with red stains, her fur having been dragged along the floor the entire way in.

Chase sighed at their apprehension. "Oh trust me, it's like walking into the depth of hell itself. But like I said: Nothing in here can actually hurt you, just stay by my side. Would it help if I went first, and you held my tail?" He offered, also looking to Marshall. "And you can go behind Everest, so-"

"Oh hell no." The husky spoke up. "No one touches my tail."

"No it's fine, I'll go." Marshall said with exasperation, pushing past the husky and shepherd. "Whatever makes this end faster." Before anyone could protest, the medic squeezed himself into the passage, hurriedly shuffling into the abyss. Watching him leave, Chase shrugged and looked toward the remaining dog.

"I'm not going in there." Everest backed up.

"You think I want to? But everyone else has gone already, you might as well."

"Honestly dying of heatstroke sounds better."

"Not if I can help it." Chase appeared behind her, pushing his forehead into her rear to shove the husky along. Everest immediately dug her paws into the floor, hitting the brakes and turning herself into an unmovable object. "Damn it Everest-" the shepherd grimaced, gritting his teeth as he struggled to push her. "Just... move!" With a burst of strength he overpowered her, shoving her body forward.

"Aah! Fine!" She barked, stumbling to her footing. "You don't have to be a jerk about it! Just..." Her voice quivered slightly, turning to face the tunnel. "Just stay behind me, please."

"What are friends for?" Chase huffed, appearing at her side.

With a final look of hesitation, Everest gingerly climbed up, although initially recoiling from the putrid smell, and pushed her way in. Watching the husky disappear into the darkness, Chase took a deep breath, speaking aloud into his radio collar. "Dutch, if you're still listening, -and I know you are- if we make it out of this, I'm personally going to kill you. Either me, or Rocky will." Bringing forward all the courage he could muster, Chase braced himself and charged into the wet orifice, not caring to hear any kind of response from the other end.

The tunnel was immensely tight, squeezing around his body with clenching, fleshy inner walls. Chase grimaced as he crawled, fighting the compression like a hamster trapped in a pipe. Don't think about it, he told himself, don't think about it, think of anything else but the current situation. The low freedom of movement was squeezing anxiety through his limbs, causing faint waves of panic that disoriented him. If he didn't have a fear of tight spaces, he certainly did now. He could even hear someone screaming up ahead, their voice too muffled for Chase to place it.

He wouldn't get a break from the awful experience until he felt the floor soften under him. Gravity took hold, and Chase slid out through the exit into a puddle of goo. "Ugh, what the-" He shook himself off, only to stop midsentence as he opened his eyes to the world before him. Everyone else was already here, all drenched in sliming fluids and rearing in awestruck horror.

The Omnihive wasn't just a nest.

The world opened up before them, spanning into a glistening realm of red. The landscape was made up entirely of bloodied biomass all hastily squeezed and strung up within one another, forming clumps of gore that made the ground they walked on. Like crude party streamers, mutated growths of bone and muscle littered the ground as far as an eye could see, acting as disgusting, meaty flora to breathe life into the hellscape. The heat only continued, basking through their fur and clothes for an uncomfortable sweating. The ceiling of the cave was so high up that the fog obscured it, painting the illusion of a looming sky above. A whole world lied before them, miles of flesh-coated hills and biomes waiting to be explored by some poor, doomed soul.

"Hollow Earth, eh?" Rocky said, staring agape at the realm they had walked into.

Ryder took the first steps forward, looking around the dim land with a puzzled expression. "Where's the light coming from? We're miles underground yet it looks like the late afternoon out here."

"I'd rather not find out. Besides, I have a feeling that'll be the least of our worries." Replied the mix, speaking to Ryder without hostility for the first time. "This is nothing like what happened to our basement."

"I'm guessing Feroxmalis was homesick." Chase reared with awe-filled shock at the bloodied landscape. "This isn't even a nest, it's a-"

"Yeah." Ryder breathed, already knowing what Chase was saying. "This is their home."

The planet gurgled underneath them, emitting low vibrations of a language unknown to anyone. Everest still hadn't moved, overstimulated by the fierce unknown. She almost didn't even believe what she was seeing, her brain going into panic as it tried to absorb everything before it.

They stood in silence scanning the new vile imagery to haunt their dreams, until Dutch's voice chimed in. "If you're not too busy admiring nature, we still have a mission to complete here."

It was all a bizarre canvas of flawed muscle, not without its own cancerous structures to infect the landscape. Rocky gawked as his vision narrowed on the far horizon, where tree-like objects sprang up in the hundreds. Trees? In a world like this? Chase saw them too, turning his gaze toward them, and they both felt their hearts drop as they approached them closer, traveling carefully across the red landscape.

They resembled trees, quite well in fact, but only by trunk and branches. There was not a single leaf, fruit, or vine on any of them, the plants instead housing a sinister design. Clumps of biomass, shredded bodies dripping red, crumpled chunks that were once living beings, all decorated along its branches like horrid flowers. It dripped blood from every branch, draining out the carcasses strung into its arms, the entire ensemble held together with stringy, intestine-like vine.

Chase stared up at the gore tree, hopeless defeat in his eyes. "Rocky, where in God's name are we?"

The captain sighed, overcome with despair that nearly broke his will to keep going. He spoke a single word. "Hell."

"Dogtrees." Ryder noted, stepping aside as the scientists pulled out cameras and started snapping pictures. "That's what Archline calls them." He walked to the dogs, but there was clear hesitation in his step. He kept a solid distance away from the dogtree, his body unwilling to go any further. "We don't have much information on how these things grow, let alone where all the meat on them comes from. Either it grows with the tree, or the Feroxs hang it up themselves."

"Why is it called a dogtree?" Marshall asked.

"Your guess is as good as mine. I don't have the clearance to find out, I'm just a mercenary." He pointed his gloved hand to the horizon, outlining a depraved forest of the meat trees. "The research outpost is through there, that's our destination."

"What about-" Chase tried to speak, only to be interrupted as a twisting ring entered his head. He tried to play it off, twitching his ears in an attempt to look unbothered, but it quickly evolved into an irritating static. Each corner of his skull began to sting, making the shepherd wince and turn away, struggling to shake the headache. The static persisted, clouding his thoughts and plugging his ears, refusing to cease until he was on the verge of a nosebleed.

"Hey, you alright?" Everest came to him, reaching out to touch his shoulder.

"Mm- yeah," the shepherd shook off the pain. "Weird... weird headache."

"This place must have some kind of effect on us." She said, continuing to stand by him.

Surely that was it. A terrible world that attacked the mind just as much the eyes, it was a logical conclusion to come to. Then why did Chase feel so unsure? He gave the husky a nod, hiding the uncertainty in his mind. Why did he feel so strongly that it wasn't the case? If it was true, then everyone else should be feeling symptoms as well, and they weren't. Horrified all around, maybe, but no one else was visibly straining under migraines.

His ears lowered with a fearful frown, anxiety burning through his red-stained fur. Was something wrong with him?

"What were you saying?" Ryder was looking at him weirdly.

"Me and... Everest," said the shepherd dog. "We were supposed to do something different."

"Head across the bare plains to the mountains." Dutch spoke right up as if he were patiently waiting to speak. "You'll encounter the inner tunnels, ring me once you get there."

"Hey, does anyone have any water?" Chase said, once again noticing Everest's heated condition. Ryder shrugged, and the scientists looked at one another.

The husky in the lab coat thought for a moment, before digging around in one of his backpack pockets and producing a small bottle of water. "She can have mine."

"Aren't you hot too?" Said one of the other workers, looking at their comrade with befuddlement.

"She... clearly needs it more than me."

"You're sure?" Chase walked up to him, disbelief in his voice. "Because-"

"Yes, I'm sure. Take it."

The shepherd looked down at the bottle, then back at him. He felt pity for the kind animal, yet happy there was at least one good dog within the Archline Foundation. "Thank you," he said gratefully. "What's your name?"

"Averus." Said the worker, and he turned to his two companions. "And this is Danny and Parker."

"Well it's nice to meet you three, but I'm afraid this is short-lived." Rocky looked around the group. "Dutch wants us to separate. In the literal valley of death, mind you."

"It'll be fine, captain." Chase waved off, then immediately realized what he said. "Well, no. Actually I'm pretty sure things are about to get really bad. But we have no choice."

The mix grew increasingly concerned. "I just have this lingering feeling that I'm never going to see you again."

Ryder chimed in. "You probably won't."

"Shut it." Rocky sharply growled at the human. "Unless it's meaningful or helpful, I'm not gonna listen to a word you say."

"I'll make it out of this, Rocks." Chase said softly, feeling fearful at the thought of splitting up. "And she will too." He flicked his ears at his husky companion.

While Ryder watched with crossed arms, the two brothers surrendered to their situation and said their goodbyes. Marshall hadn't yet said anything, but Chase knew him well enough to read the thoughts in his mind. "You'll be okay, Marsh." He said, trying to be reassuring. "Just stick with Rocky... and Ryder, if you must."

"I'm literally the leader of this squad." The boy quipped.

Although unsure of himself, Marshall gave a feeble nod. "Okay."

After the emotional departure, the group finally divided and went their respective directions. Ryder, Rocky, Marshall, and the scientists marched toward the forest of dogtrees, ready to enter the twisted secrets within it. Having no one but each other, Chase and Everest began for the mountains of bone, all while Dutch listened in on every little action of the teams. Despite the seemingly empty hellscape, neither squad could realize the dozens of eyes watching them from afar.