She had been in the brooding nest when the first messages were sung up the links, soothing hairs of the nursery drone aside her going rigid as they were frantically stroked across her middle tibia.“Ktcvahnaah-Colony is swarming.” Her alarm signal was instinctive, and before she had even begun to set antennae vibrating in response, her feeling flowed through halls of her colony.
The brooding nest was not her largest, only fifteen layers deep, yet even had she been in the sweeping caverns of Hollowcore she knew that mere moments would be needed to join her thoughts to the chorus.
The scent trails of her colony were a thing of legend.
“Direction and number.”“Faderise.
Single column, ten wide.” She was speaking with the secondary observers on the surface, their distinctive taste on the message flowing down the links of bodies and across the chemical trails binding the colony together.
They were accurate.
They also were speaking nonsense.
She accepted the information.
Her form crunched at the smooth rock coated with grass beneath her, and sung low praise that she had not been here to birth, only to inspect the hatchings.
This was no time to be slowed by bloated gaster.
The information was relayed into the song of the colony by the nearby attendants, who pushed to assist her movement to rise.“Designate swarm as hostile.
Secondary scouts observe.
Primary scouts engage.
Target spotters on flanks.
Disrupt the column.”“No spotters present in hostile swarm.” The observer’s message jerked her to halt.
Antenna twitching about the air, ordering those nearest to prepare the army and have her armor prepared without truly conscious thought on her behalf.
Her mind was otherwise involved, processing everything she knew about Ktcvahnaah-Colony.
Neutral, neither a threat nor under sway of her colony.
They were a two-nest people, fungal farming and breeding split, who had been here when she had settled Skthveraachk-Colony on their borders.
She had chosen this spot for her brooding nest specifically for its proximity to them; their breeding chambers were tens of thousands of lengths away, their farming operations situated between her borders and the core of Ktcvahnaah-Colony’s strength.
Her army outnumbered theirs six to one, and even if they massed for a swarm, the influx of bodies to their farming grounds would cause their song to become discordant.
They would be disorganized, their attack slow.
But they would never forget to send spotters to guide their assault.
Not even yearling mothers would forget that.
She clicked mandibles once, and this time, refused the information.“Repeating last.
Designate swarm as hostile.
Secondary scouts observe.
Primary scouts engage.
Target spotters on flanks.
Disrupt the column.”“No spotters present in hostile swarm.”In a triple column, the outer wings could function as guidance for the central.
In a single column, to move without spotters was to move with half a head.
A wild, unguided mass.
But the observers had reconfirmed, and she had wasted time already questioning.
They were accurate.
The information made no sense, but it was accurate.
A quick check of her surroundings was made, and it was right; menial drones relaying messages up and down the tunnel, passing around and above her while she strode towards the middle layers.
A few requests for reinforcements, denied.
Questions of enemy composition, answered.
They had not readied defenses for an attack, but the voices were in harmony.
Swarming against superior numbers with an unguided vanguard was sickness.
Sky pull them up, what was Ktcvahnaah thinking?“Do not attack.
Primary scouts observe at forty lengths, secondary relay.
Army musters…” She tapped one of her antennae against the carapace of nearest drone, requesting a map.
It repeated the motion, the message bearing her unique scent, overpowering other requests and commands.
Above ground the workers, pulling food and the rubble with which to block tunnel access if necessary, paused their work to spread and feel the soil.
A hundred bodies danced, and returned their findings down the chain.
The world above was drawn out on her thorax, and she continued without ever having paused message in first place.
“…hundred-sixty lengths faderise from Gelra-entrance to nest.
Line the trees.
Defense scenting on rise in land.”“Received.” She chittered, and a faint excitement began to waft from her sacs to color the melody being composed.
A touch of eagerness for her troops, but not enough to have them break formation.
Gelra-entrance was good.
Positioned well.
She was not sure if Ktcvahnaah-Colony had spitters, but the trees would provide some shelter from the arcing acid if so.
And even only single length rise in ground would force their soldiers to bite upward while hers angled down.
Another request for reinforcements from the other nests was denied once again, though this time with an additional harsher nip of spur for the soldier who had sent it.
Even as she entered the arming chambers, Skthveraachk doubted she would reach the surface in time to join the fighting.
The garrison stationed at the precious brooding nest was second in size only to Hollowcore itself, and weakening her other nests to defend against this mad rabble was unacceptable.
Indeed, the first messages of engagement reached her while attendants were still fitting her into her shell.“Hostile swarm is not attacking.” The observers spoke, and she slapped aside the menial expelling sealant onto her helm.
“Explain.”“We have killed eighty-five.
Hostile swarm continues to approach.
Hostile swarm is not attacking.
Scent marks of supplication.” Impossible.
She had not doubted the words of her colony, let alone her army, since the last laying.
This rise, she had doubted twice.
Whatever this deception was, whatever its purpose was, she would not alter.“Orders remain.
Hold at trees.
Bring spitters within thirty lengths but do not have them attack.
Continue.” Her song was not in harmony, and it could be felt in the chorus.
If there was some attempt to surround, if Ktcvahnaah-Colony was throwing itself at her to distract from a second assault, the spitters would be ready to slow their advance in time to divert her line.
She rattled her antennae, told the menials to resume work binding the armor around her.
It had been taken from the shell of an allomyrite, the largest the memories swore had ever been seen, that had been felled while she personally led the hunt.
Cut and shaped to guard over a hundred of her strongest caste, yet the largest portion had been taken only for her.
Headdress curved down to cover neck and around to prevent snapping of joints where legs joined thorax.
She caught reflection of herself in its polished, beautiful sheen, and could read the indecision on her face.
“Report.”“We hold at trees.
We have killed two-hundred and seventy…one.
Eight of ours dead, killed in hostile death spasms.
Hostile swarm continues to approach.
Hostile swarm is not attacking.
Scent marks of supplication.” Her core trembled.
Her mandibles seized.
They were offering their biomass.
Not the biomass of their farms or even smallest slaves taken.
The observers were accurate.
These were soldiers.
They were offering the biomass of their army to a colony who had not even attacked them.
Surrendering.
Why did that make her gaster shiver? Her reflection stared back, unanswering.
When she spoke again, it was with re-affirmed guidance.“Cease defense.
Designate swarm as unknown non-hostile.
Do not allow below.
Begin moving them inside our borders.
Demand link with their Queen.”“Reciev-““Skthveraachk, may your song endure forever.
I offer submission and service under your voice.
My colony, one, under yours.” Her observer had barely time to send acknowledgement before her attendants bristled, the foreign melody of outside colony sent down the layers to her chamber.
So fast and clear, it sent Skthveraachk momentarily reeling.
It was near close enough to having the other queen face-to-face, the barriers in their scent and words almost non-existent.
Messages were always less accurate the further they traveled between competing nests, not even the most expeditious brewers could craft scent-trails different colonies would universally accept.
Clarity meant closeness.
Ktcvahnaah was in the swarm herself, singing with a desperate and ill-balanced formality.
Skthveraachk tapped drones incessantly, ordering them double their speed of armoring her, and sent messages to prepare runners to her other nests.
She forced her melody to hold a surety she no longer felt.“Ktcvahnaah, may sky never taste you.
I have not attacked you.
This nest adheres to our borders.” Above, the rumble of feet sent trembling through the network of chambers and passageways.
The larger of her army had prepared selves, donned their protections, and were making way to surface.
“Why do you bring discord to my colony?”“My nests are gone.” The wailing was as if speaking of a breeding mother’s passing.
But the tone was wrong for it.
“Your nests have been taken? Your nests are destroyed?”“My nests are gone.” Ktcvahnaah sent the message with a wave of marking upon the backs of the drones relaying message, and it was a reeking, terrified confusion.
The disharmony of another nest made the workers it touched tap with excitement instinctively, yet each note added began to warp and change the tone of exchange.
“My nests are gone, the ground torn apart.
My brood is carried with me.
My line cannot end here.
Accept us.
We will serve the resplendent Skthveraachk-Colony, and lend our voices to your chorus until the death of the song.” Even a defeated colony would be massive boon to her forces; willing supplication most often turned to vassal nests in the future, unlike slaves taken by force.
She had never felt the cords of slavery appealing, and preferred to use those defeated for their biomass.
Yet the two vassals she currently held, and with a third… no.
The feeling was unshakable, an earworm gnawing within her skull.“Which Colony has taken your nests?”“I do not know.”“Repeating last.
Which colony has destroyed your nests?”“I do not know.” “Repeating last.
What has destroyed your nests?”“I do not know.” Each repeat was a bite to chest, but Skthveraachk cared less and less each time the other Queen returned with the same answer.
To so openly doubt the carriers of her message was insult piled upon insult, and yet still, she was answered with submission as befit a slave-caste.
Had any spoken to her in such a way, Skthveraachk would have mobilized entire colony to tear them apart.
There was no strategy.
No distraction.
She imagined the verdant plains above covering Ktcvahnaah’s territory, and then imagined them gone.
Her drones and soldiers, not eaten or enslaved, but gone.
The image did not flow.
The image made no sense.
Yet the other Queen believed, with all she was, it was the accurate image.
She needed information.“Ktcvahnaah-Colony, I accept you in my choir as you join your voices with mine.
From now until the song dies, you will be part of-“ Danger signals erupted across the nest like a thousand lashes from the stormy sky sparking their fires on ground.
More of Ktcvahnaah-Colony coming across the boundaries of her territory? She had already designated them non-hostile.
“Designate swarm as friendly! Begin clipping and marking with nest’s scent!““Unknown living creatures within territory.
Forty-four primary scouts dead.” The secondary observers continued to relay, but this was not as before.
Alarm signals had already been triggered.
This was the smell of death, or the final release of warnings before the mind was gone.
Her scouts had still been watching the swarming column, but had been struck by something unseen.
Heat, burning, dissolving, then death.
From the direction of Ktcvahnaah’s former nest.
Her armor was secured, at last.
She nearly tore her legs free as she began to push for the upper layers.“Bring Ktcvahnaah to feeding chambers.” It was the largest space nearest to the ground above.
Whatever miscommunication was occurring, there was no time for it.
The danger of meeting a queen in person was no longer present in her mind; the danger of whatever was occurring above dominated all.
“Report on column.”“It is being destroyed at the rear.
The swarm is cutting trees to use as protection.
The trees are being set on fire.”“What is attacking them?”“Unknown.” That word again.
She ordered runners to begin laying scent trails to the nearest of her nests, which would in turn spread them further out.
Such connections would not last long, and she designated fifty additional drones to each to keep them reinforced.
This was no swarming.
This was something that had already destroyed two nests, and now, was following Ktcvahnaah’s army here.
“Vibrations are small, and then massive.
Fire and something else masking scent.
No sight on the enemy.” Her scouts had the best visions in the colony, up to sixty lengths.
It would be utilized.“Order primary scouts to break from watching column.
Locate and identify attackers.”“Received.” She managed to rise all of a single layer through the ever more frantically racing tunnels buzzing with increasing stress before response was sent back.
“Twenty primary scouts are dead.
No sight on enemy.” Calm down.
The feeling was as instinctive as the fear had been, but reinforced with a clench of her mandibles and digging of hooks into slowly softening soil as they rose through the layers.
Why did she feel this way? This churning inside of her.
There was nothing in the catalogues she had not fought.
Her colony had grown and endured for a thousand cycles.
They had survived.
There was nothing to fear.
And there was nothing that could kill one of her people from over sixty lengths without them ever seeing it.
Nothing that could make nests ‘gone’, like the last breath from an aged Queen.
Calm down, and think.
Confirm.“Pull back primary scouts.
Send five in foraging pattern towards faderise.
Maintain thirty lengths behind them.
Observe and report.
Fall back if they are killed.”“Received.” She waited, antenna twitching.
A census was taken quickly of what she had available, electing for the faster general numbers than a precise count.
Two-hundred fifty scouts.
Four-hundred spitters.
Two-thousand soldiers, varying caste.
Six thousand menials, non-combatants.
And the final hundred and fifty successful creations still kept below in the breeding chambers.
All of whom she ensured were ordered instantly to be moved towards the rear exits and carried to Hollowcore.
Or at the very least, to the nearest farming nest, along with the eggs which were already being harvested and being prepared for evacuation.
“All five scouts killed.
Horizontal lightning, bright flashes, causing burning and melting.
Relaying scent patterns.” Something clicked within her.
That indecision and fear, built unto singular response.
As the smell of melting chitin and meat was passed to her down the line, she let a breath leave her lungs.
Something new.
Something different.
There were procedures, actions not taken since she was a mere queenling under her mother’s symphony, that were to be done.
When faced with the unknown, they adapted, as their people, as their colony had since the song’s birth.
Surety in familiarity.
Whatever they were, these creatures, they had spitters that could fire in straight lines, at distances of over sixty lengths.
Information.
She could use it.
The sweeping roof of the feeding chamber soared overhead, the bloated form of Ktcvahnaah already seated near empty rock and wood troughs.
Perhaps they would eat together after the rise.
Now, there was work to do.This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval.
Report any appearances on Amazon.Two nursery drones had taken task of smearing the pap across length of the former independent Queen, removing her own signals and replacing them with the colony’s.
Still, it was foreign enough that the drones around them moved nearer and made show of advancing then retreating in warning as Skthveraachk pressed forward.
Laid her armored head forward, looking over the egg-swollen gaster of her opposite and marveled how the fatter female could even move.
Passing judgement, engrained, on how much thicker her limbs and core was compared to the sleek armoring of Skthveraachk herself.
This Queen had never seen combat.
Few ever did.
Ktcvahnaah repeated the motion, and their antennae touched and vibrated together.“Your attackers are at my borders.
Give me all the information you have.”“Dangerous.
Extremely dangerous.
They control fire, they control the ground?” Even connected physically, the other Queen struggled to describe.
Sensations were drawn out at first on her helm, but she guided the other to press at her unarmored face instead, just above her mandibles.
She needed to understand without any omission.
“Sound, loud ruptures.
Ground was opened and flung outward.
Exposed four layers of nest.
Four-thousand six-hundred eighty-seven dead, no confirmed contact with any enemy.
I ordered it abandoned.”“Where did they come from? They are not slaving?” Her tempo was rushed.
The border was still hundreds of lengths away, but her scouts were progressively reporting themselves nearer the nest.
The creatures were advancing, and she needed more time.
“Segment.
Foraging pattern, twenty soldiers per line, five lines.
Locate, converge, and attack from both sides.” The rubbing of her forelimb against nearest drone had grown so incessant, the hairs had begun to fray on the slighter female’s body.
Catching the pain out of corner of eyes, Skthveraachk ordered it to assist with the egg transport.
Wearied and quick appreciation came, another drone taking place as the former marched quick for the tunnels.
‘Received’, came the reply, and she returned her mind to the here.
“How many are there?”“We felt trembles in the soil early rise, coming from the faderise.
Smelled alarm and danger signals from Chkervthnaakt-Colony when we investigated.” Chkervthnaakt? They were at war with Ktcvahnaah for ten cycles now.
Whatever these things were, they had attacked three colonies, perhaps six nests or more, with no rhyme beyond a constant traveling from faderise to risefade.
A single, unbroken line of direction.
“Returned to the nest, prepared soldiers, and was attacked shortly after.
Sent eight-hundred in first swarm, all were killed.
Two thousand in the next swarm, all were killed.
They ignored my dead.
They seem not to eat until there is no longer a threat.” The touch to leg was message from observers once more.
“Attack failed.
Hostile creatures located a hundred and four lengths past foraging line.
Soldiers were killed before reaching them.
Eight managed to get close enough to see, last messages stated ‘Numerous spotted.
Large moving square rocks.
Bipedal, smaller creatures beside.
Single column, forty-wide-“ Her breath caught in her throat.
“-Three deep.” And was hissed out in that maddening confusion.
Stretching your forces so thin, even covering so much ground, was madness.
One break, and the enemy was behind you, all over you, intermingled in your line.
If but a few reached you-…no.
No.
She felt her mandibles chitter.
If her spitters could fire a hundred lengths in straight lines, it is what she would do too.
No need for a tight defensive column, no need to lob over the heads of her forces.
She would cut down the enemy before it reached her.
Straight bolts of light, a long, stretched line.
Swarming had failed three times.
Swarming was no longer an option.
But, did that mean they needed to see their targets coming? A thin line meant the left could not functionally support the right.
A hundred lengths to the spotters, the spotters just over a thousand lengths to the treeline defense line.
Like when the Founding Colonies purged the chelicerites, you did not swarm into their lair; you drew them out to you.
“Fifty soldiers, have them burrow and wait a hundred and fifty lengths ahead of the advancing hostile column on the rightmost end.
Scatter twenty soldiers across the middle, bait the creatures closer with their meat, converge on their right when those burrowed emerge.” This was less probing.
This, she felt, had a chance.
The orders were more complicated, the maneuver less engrained in the soldiers.
She allocated a scentcrafter to reinforce the message.
“Prioritize capture and dissection.
Prioritize passing of information gained.” “Received.” Information.
Her mind boggled at the idea of ‘moving square rocks’, trying to chant the image of boulders crawling over the soil as if pushed by some tremendous wind.
She focused herself, refused to let mind stray into what was not from what was.
Her head was brought back up, the horned crest of her helm outlined against all’s sight, and her antenna gave few final thrums.
“Take the menials.
Proceed to my farming nest.
Share the notes with chorus there.” It would take long for Ktcvahnaah’s song to be as her own, but they had sealed the agreement.
She had been marked with Skthveraachk’s chemicals.
The Queen belonged to her now, and while without indoctrination it would always be risk that she may rebel, sentient leadership is what she needed, now and always.
Weight could be seen lifting from the other Queen’s form at the realization, if with confusion.
Skthveraachk did not have time to explain it.
“Relay my orders.
I will stay here and learn what I can.
I will keep your soldiers.
They will be needed.”“Yes, Skthveraachk.
May we craft the hymn of your compassion and victory together soon.” Ktcvahnaah was applying a tenth smear as she and ten of the nearby drones departed, but given the circumstance, it was difficult to blame her.
And somehow, Skthveraachk doubted the fatter Queen truly expected to see her alive again.
With no other matured mother present, Ktcvahnaah could adopt her entire colony with little challenge.
Her song was crude and greedy, weak and fearful.
The other Queen had just assured, should Skthveraachk fall silent this day, an ascension of power tripling the size of her colony.
Assuming, of course, whatever was burning its way towards the brooding nest stopped there.
Skthveraachk doubted it would stop there.“Forty-two dead.
Five creatures and one rock killed.” The discomfort in the observer’s rhythm at the notion of ‘killing’ something like water was noted, but there was no better word.
Joy bubbled upwards.
They could be killed.
Information.
“Creatures: Two legs, two arms with graspers, shells are not particularly tough, head appears to be at top of body when upright but unsure of importance.
Four died while being dragged underground, the last after cutting shell off.
Removal of a single limb seems sufficient to cause loss of combat viability.” A smooth section of wall nearby was found, and she let the vibrations flow through the chorus to reach her.
Feeling out as one of her soldiers, body torn and bleeding but still alive, tugged a mangled mess of flesh away from the site of combat.
The other surviving soldiers providing him protection with their bodies, that he may get the prize back to their nest across the bumpy terrain, burned and scarred.
His touches replicated to give her view of the creature’s corpse it carried.
Revulsion shook her to the core.
Like some kind of half-grown larvae that had been born with but a fraction of its carapace and an exoskeleton barely strong enough to stop fluids from gushing out.
More of a wet sack than a proper living thing.
This was what had made the Ktcvahnaah-Colony ‘gone’?“What of the rock?” Part of her wished to move closer, to speed these exchanges and let her scent invigorate troops.
The other part kept her firmly nested eight layers down.
A bizarre enemy, capable of tearing up four layers of nest by some method unknown, yet crawled towards her.
She would remain, but she would do so with caution.
“The…like-rock-not-rock,” She gave her arm a rake down the drone aside her, spurring the report on.
Not-rock would be fine.
It was added to the lyrics.
“The not-rock burned three soldiers trying to get under it.
The bottom is on fire, and it floats on the air like on water.” She was about to ask for a repeat, but had given up questioning the wrongs being sent to her.
Trembling was coming through the soil above.
Distant, but growing nearer.
Some rocks floated now.
Very well.
Information.
“Pierced rockshell with difficulty, but it did not leak fluids.
The smaller creatures were eaten by it but seemed unharmed inside.
Unable to reach them through holes made.
All were spitters and shot through the holes created in the rockshell.
Not-rock is half buried and unmoving, but makes noise and is alive still.”“Not-rocks are hostile?”“Confirmed.
Are spitters as well of some kind.
Create large holes in ground from impact and disorient soldiers nearby.” Nine-hundred lengths to the line of trees, and little more to Gelra-entrance beyond.
The thought began to echo and hum throughout the chambers as the creatures came closer.
Protect the nest.
Protect the nest.
“Hostile creatures continuing approach.
Three primary scouts dead.” The plan had worked.
Now was the time to commit.
“Four-hundred soldiers, have them burrow and wait a hundred and fifty lengths ahead of the advancing hostile column.
Single column, thirty wide.” The ground shook above, the wall on which Skthveraachk drew out information beginning to flake from her constant motions.
Two-thousand and some feet abruptly made animate.
“Sixty soldiers, scatter across the middle, bait the creatures closer with flesh, converge on their line when those burrowed emerge.” “Received.”The scentcrafter sent request for another two glands, her reserves diminishing rapidly as she scuttled about surface laying the markers for army.
Her army was working towards frenzy at steady pace, but training and the eldest of her children running the length of line kept them ready to receive commands.
They chanted and clamored for attack, each death on the surface releasing alarm and danger signals which wafted back on breeze and ran through the trails laid, demanding action.
Protect the nest.
Not enough information.
Did the not-rocks eat the creatures to stay docile? Could she control them? She assigned a few breeders to consider the question, but only because they had no other role currently, what with the evacuation of the eggs.
Such thoughts were unproductive in the now.
The not-rocks were enemies.
The creatures were enemies.
In the feeding chamber, motes of debris rattling free of ceiling’s curve, issuing a hundred commands a second, she waited.“Two-hundred forty-four dead.
One-hundred twenty-six creatures killed.
Eighteen not-rocks killed.” The information roared through the nest, chorus melding to operatic exultation.
Her fear ebbed, and the nest echoed her relief.
“Not-rocks attack so long as hostile creatures remain inside.
Removing them removes life from not-rocks.” Information.
She ventured sight out to the field, bidding observers relay the scene from closer now that danger had passed.
Like some manner of storm had passed, but fire having ousted fluid.
The ground pockmarked with indentations, craters, jagged cuts that still were felt to sizzle when observer soldiers drew near.
Unnatural and pitched sounds from the burning field of upturned soil where the detachment of her army was cleaving apart any of the creatures who remained.
The abundance of danger signals ensured any movement not of the colony was treated as threat, and even a few phidos, pudgy bodies bounding across the battleground seeking cover, were seized upon and torn apart without hesitation.
“Single bite enough to puncture seeming any area of the bipedal creatures’ bodies.” Information.
“Spitting orifice can be removed from arms with little difficulty.” Information.
“Remaining primary scouts indicate no further foreign bodies within nearby bord-“Dirt poured loose from the ceiling, a cascade crushing down and smothering Skthveraachk to floor.
Eyes were blinded, the song vanished in instant as she was pinned beneath the avalanche.
The world was shaking.
She sucked back a breath in panic, and took a half-mouthful of dirt directly down trachea.
Scrabbling, clenching of graspers, mandibles digging to her armor and pulling her away.
Her drones were on her in an instant, attendants shovelling free the debris, but it was a wild and unguided set of actions.
Her core was on fire.
She hacked and coughed and puked.
There was air racing through the tunnels.
How could there be a breeze here? Blind still, she thrust her right forelimb out, seeking, demanding connection.
It came weakly, the attendant to whom it belonged similarly suffocating beneath the debris.
“-er… seven..
hundred and… and… and… killed.
Unknown at…defending…from sky heralds…” The melody of the observer she had been in contact with ceased.
Another rose in its place.“Nine-hundred twenty-seven soldiers severed from the song.
Presuming them dead.
Upper layers of nest exposed.
Eight-hundred and twelve menials severed from the song.
Presuming them dead.
Eighty-seven spitters killed, fourteen severed from the song.
Presuming them dead.” Blood oozed from her mouth.
She could feel it dripping out, knew it soaking the bile muddying dirt as she hacked and coughed and wheezed.
Gone.
The top two layers of the brooding nest were gone.
Near two thousand severed from the song.
Not killed.
Gone.
No coherent messages came from the battleground, the foremost observers now only a few dozen lengths from the treeline.
Pieces of her people were felt underfoot as maddened drones reeled, seeking to obey ten different instinctive commands of defense, protection, attack and retreat.
Where had it come from? What had just happened? “There is something shrieking on the air.
We are unable to determi-“ The ground was alive.
The very rocks were shivering.
Was this what it was to die? Her drones, this time, formed a tent around her as another cascade of dirt from above nearly sent her back into breathless abyss.
The attendant’s arm went limp in hers, hairs stilled, melody faded.
When another rejoined the link, there were thirty observers left.“Three-hundred fifty-five soldiers severed from the song.
Presuming them dead.
Two more layers of nest have been exposed.
Area is on fire.
One-thousand six-hundred and fourteen menials severed from the song.
Presuming them dead.
Sixty seven…” The numbers continued.
The designations could not be listed in timely fashion.
Half of the brooding nest was… gone.
Another clench from her stomach in gaster, and she puked out what remained of the morning’s paste.
Smelling, if not seeing, the blood still dripping from between mandibles.
Gone.
Gone.
Information.
She knew what it was now to be gone.
Not a single tale, story, ballad nor the grandest epics stored in Halls of the Rapturous knew what she now held.
And not a single one of them, thus, could help her now.
“Trees are on fire.
Ground is on fire.
Menials are dousing flames.
Menials are rebuilding the top layer of nest.
One thousand lengths to our border has been changed.
The scent markers are gone.
Advise us.
Advise us.”They were alone.