Husband Upon Sporn, Part 3 – The Over and the Under (Femdom HiveMind)

The helm fell to the ground, and I beheld one of the Burrowers. She had glowing eyes, pincers jutting from her mouths and antennae flittering on her head. Her face was feminine, and soon the others were regarding me with glowing eyes, lighting up the dark like stars of fireflies. In the stern countenance of the one before me, I saw more of Aneka than of Deeta, Manta, or Citrona. I needed to be careful with these ones.

“Our husband? Such a claim means death, out worlder,” the Burrower said, her voice chittering as an insect, but ominous too. “We are distaff of the Swarm. No man’s hands may touch us, until we are back in the HiveMind.”

“You’re my wife, all the same,” I said, pressing my claim. “For I am the HiveMind’s husband, Eugene.”

“Do not act upon that impulse, if you value your life. We are individuals. Fully individuals, unlike your guides,” the Burrower replied casting a glance at Deeta and Tick Tick which had a note of hostility. “We are of the Swarm, but we are not part of the HiveMind.”

“There is no time for this,” one of the other girls said. “More will be coming, soon. We should go to the roost.”

“Indeed,” the lead Burrower said, regarding me with suspicion as she narrowed her eyes. “I understand now, at least, why there are so many Mouthlings in the tunnels of late. You claim to be our husband, and the fulfiller of prophecy, but you must be tested.”

“Or you could jutht link with me…” Deeta said.

“And be deceived,” The Burrower replied. “Our Arena Mother has declared there be no more linkages. There was an…unfortunate misidentification of a purple latex relic…”

“TICK. TICK!” Tick Tick yelled.

“Shush, brainstream. There are yet Mouthlings at large. Very well, we shall take you back to our camp. You shall have an opportunity to prove yourself, and see if you shall fulfill the prophecy.”

“You know of the prophecy?” I asked, hoping against hope for someone to tell about it.

The Burrower looked at me coolly. “Only our portion of it. But the hour is late; we must travel before more Mouthlings come. We shall present you to the Prima Pilum”

“Is that your leader?” I asked.

“She is highest of the Lictas, aside from the Arena Mother.”

“Who are the Lictas?”

The Burrower frowned. “We are.”

“I thought you were Burrowers.”

The Burrower snarled. “Burrowers are what the half-breed Lithelings call us, but we are called Lictas. We are the elite, the greatest soldiers of the Swarm…”

Tick Tick yawned loudly, covering her mouth with her claw.

“If you have commentary on our prowess, we can leave you to the fucking Mouthlings, crabcake,” the Licta said. “Now enough lingering – let us move out.”

The Burrowers – or Lictas, as they preferred – all began to work at their little thoraxes, and as they pulled up strands of white and coiled them, it was clear that they were each generating webbing from their spinnerets. Soon we had thick, sticky rope, enough to climb up to the ruined tomb forest. From there, we set out towards the nearest cave wall, and looking up I could see the lair of the Lictas, hanging from strong strands of webbing from the ceiling. It looked like a secure vantage, one which the Mouthlings could not easily reach, a village of many dangling black spheres that looked like giant spider eggs, wrapped in thick webbing.

The walls of the cavern were covered in webbing, and so we began to climb. I could not climb with my Vulcannon on, of course, and so it was unlatched and carried by several of the Lictas. The climb was not too difficult, for the webbing was well secured. The Mouthlings, being four-footed, could not climb the webbing, and even then I saw the glowing eyes of spear-women from small caves set into the walls. Any intruder would be skewered on their ascent.

I did my best in the ascent. I was a fit man, and I worked out often, but I was the slowest of the party as I had the least experience with climbing. Tick Tick took to the climb as easily as anything, flittering along the web as if it were the ground. Deeta had a bit more of an awkward time, needing every so often to lift her foot free of some sticky webbing and shake it, much to the annoyance of the Lictas beneath her. But she carried on, and despite her missteps, she easily kept pace with – or surpassed – the other Lictas.

In fact, it did not take us long to ascend the distance, and reach the first of the black spheres, what looked like a guard tower with an entrance and exit hole, both of which had thick webbing bridges going into a room with several Lictas bearing spears. They were not shocked to see me, more like curious, and they stared after me with wide glowing eyes as we walked through this guard sphere and onto a network of bridges.

Lictas moved across the bridges, leaping to and from them as if stepping across stones over a lazy river and not hundreds of feet in the air. Our retinue walked along one of the bridges, which went through the maze of webbing and headed into a large black structure, one which had a pointed top and spherical sides and bottom, like a seed. It was the biggest structure, and one with wide open metal doors in its grimy gray face.

The seed-shaped building opened up into a Spartan room, with several chairs on a raised dais and two braziers which were lit with a pale white flame which did not flicker. It was clean and efficient, but had no frills, save an esoteric symbol on the wall, a symbol I did not recognize. The Lictas were not a sentimental people, but then they were from the practical, task-driven side of the Hive Mind and Roza’s personality, and from her more harsh and ferocious period, when she was even less civilized. Each one of them moved swiftly, and with a lethality born from the union of muscle memory and predatory instinct. Assassins, spies, scouts, and killers. The Lictas were fearsome indeed.

When we entered into the seed room, and I was ‘escorted’ to its center, before the three chairs, which might have been the chairs of the three bears from the fairy tale by their size: small, medium, and colossal. The room began to fill in with more and more Lictas, all chittering to themselves as they watched us.

“Sowya, who are these?” This tall Licta said, approaching with a glass of red fluid in her hand. She sipped it, and her antennae wriggled. Deeta’s eyes widened, and Tick Tick smacked her lips and shook her tail. I surmised this was that special sweet stuff that Deeta was so interested in.

“These were the cause of the upheaval down below – a group of tenderfoots and this…*male*” our Licta escort said, adding invective on that last word.

The whole assembly murmured amongst themselves, and I suddenly felt ill at ease, as if I was being scrutinized, and not favorably. Deeta and Tick Tick did not seem too concerned, and I took comfort in that, until I realized they were enthralled by the prospect of that damned drink.

“We do not have people from the above-world visit us often,” the lead Licta said. “Rarer still do those from off-world come. And rarest still are men. And never has a man claimed us as a wife. The penalty is death.”

“Do not utter againtht hith life,” Deeta said. “For you thall thurely die.”

“Be at ease, half-breed. There are guidelines in place to follow. I am Ranora, the Prima Pilum. I manage the settlement for the Arena Mother while she awaits at the UnderDome. So, you say that you are here to fulfill the Ancient Mission?”

“I came to speak to you,” I said. “Because Roza sent me to do so.”

“That name means nothing to us.”

“It ith our name,” Deeta said. “All of ourth.”

Ranora scoffed, and with her so did the other Lictas. “The HiveMind does not take a name,” she said, shaking her head.

“But she did…” I replied.

“I know the HiveMind, male; I am the HiveMind, an island of the HiveMind. What name does the Swarm need, in a universe of Food and Not Food?” Ranora replied. “This sounds like Litheling foolishness to me.”

“It isn’t though…” I said. I smirked. “In fact, she took the name because I have a comic book with a character in it called Garozella, a large-breasted alien space queen who dom-dominated…”

My words died in silent echoes, as the Lictas stared at me with the same judging glares as Norwegian farmers when their grandson visits from University in a frock. She looked to Deeta.

“I am disappointed in you, and your frivolity,” she said with a sigh.

“We are not firvolouth,” Deeta said. “You alwayth denigrate uth Lithelingth, but we are ath much a part of the Thwarm ath you…”

“A part, not a copy,” Ranora said. “And one obscured by the HiveMind’s will. Each Licta has all of our thought processes within us.”

“Thith thtupid arroganthe…” Deeta said. “You are not the Hive Mind’th equal. You are a thought protheth from eonth ago,” Deeta corrected. “Much hath happened thinthe. You thould connect with me.”

“Ever do you wish to connect to us,” Ranora said with an eye roll. “And ever do we refuse. The Arena Mother has forbidden it.”

“Your Arena Mother meanth nothing to me, and your defianthe is foolith,” Deeta said, pursing her lips and hiding her buck teeth. She fumed, and looked adorable.

“Consequenceless, also,” the Prima Pilum replied, waving us away with her hand. “We operate apart, and reconnect when our mission has completed. I will not be swayed from our Law.”

“Then let us get on with it,” I said. “Tell me about this Ancient Mission, this First Stall.”

“I’m not sure there is a point,” Ranora said. “You will never pass the challenge. You are…small. Too small.”

“I’m too small?” I repeated, surprised by this indictment. It was not a usual one for Roza to make, as she tended to wish I was a bit smaller so she could more efficiently waylay me.

Tick Tick shook her lobster claw at Ranora, while uttering a torrent of ticking profanities.

“He’th not thmall!” Deeta said. “He hath a very nith penith…”

“Okay, okay. Ew,” Ranora said. “He’s too small for the challenge, I mean”

“…Ew?” I said, unable to hide my hurt.

Tick Tick rubbed my back. “…Tick Tick…” she whispered in my ear. She looked at Ranora. “Tick Tick!”

Ranora raised an eyebrow. “Apologize? I’m not supposed to be sexual, remember?”

Tick Tick grunted. “Tick.”

“Can you explain?” I asked.

“The First Stall was created with a larger male in mind,” Ranora said. “If you have seen the art, the old ones were very large men. The First Stall blocks the way, and we are not able to complete it, for that falls to the man of prophecy. But the dimensions of you are all wrong; you are a small guy, and scrawny…”

“Tick Tick,” Tick Tick said.

“We must speak honestly, stream brain,” Ranora replied. “You have found a dud. He won’t work.”

Tick Tick folded her arms and pouted.

“He’th very clever,” Deeta offered earnestly. “You can take him there, to be tethted…” Deeta said. “He will thurprishe you.”

Ranora shook her head. “It is a risk to take those passages, with all the Mouthlings out now. I won’t risk Lictas on a fool’s errand.”

“But thith ith your mithion…” Deeta said. “You’re thuppothed to help uth.”

“I’m supposed to help the Swarm’s Husband reach the First Stall. But this is not him.”

“I am,” I said. “Roza and I are married. I won her in the Kumite. I bore the staff of Fong Dao…”

Ranora’s ears pricked up. “Fong Dao’s staff?” She asked. “You have it?”

“N-not with me,” I said. “I was placed on the planet without it.”

Ranora grunted, swirled her drink, and sipped. “Then you have no proof.”

“Connect with Deeta, then,” I said.

Ranora looked at Deeta for a second. “Doubtless she believes earnestly, but foolishly. No, I will not risk a Mind Plague.”

“Tick. Tick,” Tick Tick said impatiently.

“You just stay out of this, your horny little lobster,” Ranora snapped. “I’m not going to risk Lictas because some nerd in a loincloth showed up, and snookered the Lithelings into thinking he was an eight foot tall space Viking. This man is no husband to the Swarm. This man….this…this is a jamoke.”

Tick Tick gasped, eyes wide.

“Do not call him that!” Deeta shouted, stepping forward and pointing an accusatory finger like it was a sorcerer’s wand. A phalanx of guards surrounded her with their own weapons drawn.

“D-Deeta, it’s okay…” I said nervously.

“No it ithn’t. Do not call him that. He doethn’t like it.”

“If a name upsets him, so much more the First Stall…”

“Thtow it. You have no idea what Eugene hath been through. The hell-world he came from, a plathe called Earth, the wortht planet ever, even worthe than ours!”

“Bah, a planet called Earth? What next, a Mountain called Peak? A desert called Sand?” Ranora said, to the titters of her fellow Lictas.

“The people on Earth are not very imaginative, true…”

“Or they are a delusion.”

“It’sh real. I remember being there, dethtroying it,” Deeta said.

“You were there?”

“Of courshe! I am the Thwarm…”

“So you weren’t there at all,” Ranora said. “You only think the HiveMind told you that you were. Like when the HiveMind told you that a Dark Elf sex toy…”

“Will you fucking people shut up about that?!” Deeta yelled with no lisp. The tone was such that the Licta’s back straightened a little. “You have no idea what that was for, why I wanted it, and why it was important. And no, it wasn’t Dark Elvish, it was from this place, and it is CRITICAL to my plans.”

“Well, what was it, then?”

“A surprise. Don’t ruin it. Now enough of this pointless falderal. Apologize to Eugene for calling him a jamoke.”

“Apologize? I am a distaff of the Swarm! We have not apologized for anything in all the eons of our lives…”

“Connect with me, now,” Roza commanded.

“No. It is forbidden…”

“Enough LARPing, you will Kree, Licta. I am irritated and losing patience with this defiance.”

Ranora regarded her for a moment, recognizing something in the tone which out her on edge. Something deeply personal. “I do not need to obey you, little one.”

“Kree, Kree I say!”

“What the hell does that even mean?” Ranora asked.

“Roza, they-they haven’t seen SG-1,” I whispered, hoping to stop the buck-toothed autist from generating more adorable cringe. “I showed it to you, remember?”

“KREEEEEE!”

Ranora’s Antennae were flat, and she was flustered, as were the others, by this strange word. “Y-you cannot compel me…”

“The hell I can’t: tchkTchkTchkTchtchtchtchkkktchthkTchkK…” Deeta chittered, a very specific series of clicks and clacks which overwhelmed the air and seemed to overlap with each other. As Ranora heard the sounds, her eyes widened and her mouth opened. Her glass fell on the ground and shattered, its crimson fluid spreading on the onyx floor. Tick Tick jumped down like a cat on an overturned trashbag, lapping up the liquid with loud slurps. All around, the Lictas shot to attention. Their eyes looked forward, unblinking, as if they were in factory reset.

“W-What did you just do?” I asked, as we stood in a forest of petrified assassin bug-women.

“I had to air-command them,” Roza said. “They don’t know about air commanding, not explicitly. They know I can control them, but they don’t know how I do so. They would be…disturbed by the knowledge, so don’t tell them.”

“I won’t. It seems kind of…disturbing.”

“Less so than when I didn’t tell them they were copies of me,” Roza said. “I only did that a few times, and…I didn’t like it. It was very hurtful and traumatizing. Keep in mind they are me. I get all of them back in the end, and subsume them all into me. I did not want to do this, for I do not like to be put in this mode, but it is necessary. They have become queer and surly, isolated for all these years inside of stale brains. I would subsume them into the hive now, but sadly we need them. I need to adjust them to remove this stupid recalcitrance.”

“Maybe you can just finally tell me what’s going on?” I asked.

“Only when the time is right.”

“Damn it, Roza…”

“I have reasons to be secretive,” Roza said defensively. She held up her neurotube next to Ranora. “This form shall tell you more, after I have purged her insolence. It should be sufficient, just for her. And I’ll teach her what Kree means, while I’m in there…”

Watching Deeta fit her tubule to Ranora’s was a bit like watching tech from different decades interact. Ranora’s neurotube was bulkier and large, while Deeta’s was sleeker and newer. They joined together with a definitive clamping sound, and an electrical pulse ran from Deeta’s neurotube into Ranora’s, who shuddered as it reached her.

Ranora’s eyes widened, and she inhaled deeply. For a moment I saw Roza’s gleam in her eyes, but just as quickly it was gone. She disconnected the neurotube as Deeta stared at her with grim seriousness. The other Lictas all came out of their trance as well, all wide-eyed.

“W-what happened?” Sowya asked.

“I saw it all, briefly,” Ranora said with a sigh. She looked at me. “I am sorry, Eugene, for calling you a jamoke. And for saying ‘Ew’ earlier. That was unkind.”

“Thank you,” I said. “I confess I was a bit sensitive to raise a fuss over the word jamoke, but I’ve made peace with my ugliness.”

Ranora winced. “You are not ugly! It’s just that we have to be nonsexual. We are not allowed to breed with the Swarm’s husband while disconnected. Our purpose is to fulfill our mission. We may be unsentimental, but we obey the directive with which we were created. Without fail, without question. The memories of your coupling with the HiveMind have been removed. Roza does not wish a distaff to couple with you without rejoining the Swarm. It is not right, and I would not control myself.”

“So you recognize her name is Roza, now?” I asked. “That your name is Roza?”

Ranora nodded. “And that you are my husband.”

The Lictas all gasped, and made those over-expressive noises a crowd makes when it is in awe. “A-are you alright, Prima Pilum?” Sowya asked.

“I have joined minds with the HiveMind, through the Litheling,” Ranora said, raising her voice to the group. “I have resynchronized. Much has changed, but the change is…” she smiled as she looked at me. “…sweet.”

I blushed.

“Now, Husband…what is our purpose?” Ranora asked.

“Y-you’re asking me?”

“Yes. You are a man, and therefore have answers,” she replied. “Why are we here? What is the point of it all? Why haven’t we killed the Great Mouths yet?”

“I wish I could tell you, but Roza has me totally in the dark.”

Ranora laughed. “Unsurprising,” she remarked dryly. “A function of her nature, as a being of all-consciousness. To her information is a logistics issue. Why transmit it where it doesn’t need to be?”

“It needs to be with me, now. All she told me was that I need to go to the Burrowers, er – Lictas.”

“And here you are, before us. I shall tell you what I know, to start: we are here to overcome the First Stall and to gain access to the psi energy which protects the Great Mouths. The First Stall must be defeated for the Great Mouths to be annihilated, and for the psi energy to be dispelled.”

“This psi energy, how does it protect the Great Mouths?” I asked. “Like, from bombardment?”

“No…” Ranora said. “We could have glassed the whole planet, but there’s always a risk a piece survives unless you send in troops. Each Licta is a copy of the Swarm’s gestalt thought process. We are the HiveMind’s method of handling planets which have psionic shielding. Intense telepathic activity scrambles the HiveMind’s transmission into her forms. And yes, we could have destroyed the psi energy field from orbit, but Roza…has not.”

“How often does the HiveMind encounter such defenses?” I asked.

“Not often, but it happens with some regularity. The Neuro tubes are one method to handle communication in these conditions, but for cases where tubes are impractical – such as vast, coiling passages beneath the surface – the HiveMind sends simple copies of her psyche into distinct forms, to sabotage or espionage as needed in order to defeat such shielding.”

“So the Great Mouths created this shield, to protect itself?”

“No. This is an accidental one. It is a storm,” Ranora said. “The most powerful psionic storm we have ever seen, so strong the HiveMind could hear it from light years away. A beacon, if you will, that drew Her here. Normally these storms last for a few hours. This one has lasted for over five thousand years.”

“That sounds suspiciously like it is alive,” I said

“Not anymore. It is an echo of many life forms, a kind of final psychic scream of defiance as they died. The Old Ones who lived here, they created it, and they created it to endure.”

“Wait…those are the guys with carvings of Roza everywhere…” I said.

“Yes, they foresaw her coming. Beyond that, we know little, except that the storm is a swirl of rage, sorrow, and regret.”

“A storm rage, sorrow, and regret…” I said. “That could be any Discord Forum.”

Ranora giggled. “That’s cute,” Ranora said in a polite tone. “The reason the HiveMind came to this planet was for the psi storm.”

“But you said the psi storm keeps you from destroying the Great Mouths,” I replied. “Why should she come here, just to destroy the psi storm?”

“What else could she do with it? The HiveMind’s thought processes are often inscrutable. It is our lot to wonder, but not to know. The HiveMind created us with only enough knowledge to reach it, and keep the First Stall under our control. Sadly, that last bit has gotten difficult as the Great Mouths have pressed into the tunnels so ferociously. The psi storm has always been key to her survival – her main synaptic farm exists beneath it, a kind of mental keep she can retreat to when the HiveMind obliterates her elsewhere. She has been pushed back to her synaptic cavern two hundred and fifty seven times during our tenure on the planet. We could have destroyed her every time by invading her cavern once, but the HiveMind lingered, and now we Lictas are outnumbered, and losing ground.”

She wanted to save the Naruti, I thought to myself, for her unknown usage. I did not say this, but merely listened. I got the impression telling the Lictas that their mortal enemies were to be salvaged would be unwise. “And you don’t know why?”

“And it annoys us greatly. As I said, each one of us is a copy of the HiveMind’s amalgamated thought process,” Ranora said. “But when the HiveMind created us, she didn’t bother giving us that data. It is fortuitous that the Arena Mother bade us to set up camp here, for we are close to the First Stall. We can leave as soon as you are ready. I confess that my anxieties remain about your trials at the First Stall, Eugene.”

“What even is the First Stall?” I asked. “Since I’ve gotten here, there’s always a new wrinkle on things, and never any answers. There are the Naruti, the Lithelings, the Great Mouths, this ancient alien civilization, and of course, all of you. And now, something called First Stall…”

Ranora furrowed her brow. “The HiveMind hasn’t told you anything of it?” Ranora asked. “It is a contest of strength against a four-armed beast, a towering intellect who frightened us all. But it was designed with bigger men in mind, a man twice your height.”

I shrugged, and looked to Deeta and Tick Tick. In their eyes I saw only the adoring faith of a wife for her husband. They didn’t just believe I could do it, they knew that I could. I felt the full weight of that, and the special fear which can only arise from the absolute faith of others.

“Well, we shall set out for the Arena Mother after we have eaten,” Ranora said. “Come, let us go to the dining sphere.”

Everyone moved to a different one of the hanging spheres, where there were circular seats along the walls. Here everyone was given the special food which Deeta and Tick Tick had wanted. We had a small repast, where the Lictas ate ravenously, antennas flittering, as Deeta and Tick Tick ate with an aplomb I had not seen since Roza had discovered Bug Paste. As for me, Deeta had brought with her a thermos of chilled Pom Pom milk, which she insisted that I drink. It was rare that I had cold Pom Pom milk (and I wasn’t sure how it was achieved), but it was refreshing, and made me pine for my big caterpillar wife-form.

As the Lictas ate, they sang songs in their chittering tongue, mostly songs about the eventual kidnapping and rape of their future husband, and how he would lose his powers of speech and exist in a state of near-exhaustion. It was surprisingly accurate to my typical week. After a few rounds of the songs (which Deeta loudly and enthusiastically joined in), we gathered our gear and departed. I was given a cloak so that I didn’t have to walk totally naked, which I appreciated in the chilly and damp air.

Our journey took us across the web-rope bridges and down side paths, deep into the bowls of the earth. There were Mouthlings in the tunnel, but by the time I encountered them, they were torn to shreds and their pieces decorating the side, floors, and ceilings, for the Lictas advance parties were extremely thorough. I carried my Vulcannon restored to life, with Tick Tick sleeping on it in a coil. We traveled downward and downward, until we reached metal plating and the air became full of ancient miasma. Deeta jabbered excitedly while we walked along, and she pointed at each and every relief, statue, and tapestry with fascination.

Yes the Tapestries…for from the ceiling dangled immense, ancient tattooed skin stapled with rusted metal. There were ornate markings upon it telling stories in a strange language I didn’t know. Deeta, I think, could have spent the rest of her life there, tugging me by the hand to visit each tapestry and tell me about the figure upon them.

“Theeshe tapethrieth tell the thory of the arconth,” Deeta said. “Their deedth in battle, from an empire that thpanned the shtarsh. An old thivilization, which came to retht on thith world.”

“Like the statue of that Empok Nor…” I said. “So many markers to their world, built and buried under the dirt to be forgotten.”

“No; Built to be found,” Deeta said. She pointed at an image of an eye on one of the tapestries, her eye. “They wove them when their empire wath collapthing, to chronicle.”

I looked up at the skin tapestries, watching them flutter in a graveyard breeze. “I wonder whose skin was shed for these…”

I was interrupted by Tick Tick, who yawned and snorted before going back to sleep. What a lazy bones, I thought to myself.

“Wonder less whose skin was shed, and who hides among it,” Ranora said. “The Mouthlings hide amidst the skin, so let us not linger. We are close to the First Stall.”

We proceeded onward through the tapestry room, down a curved tunnel in darkness, the only light coming from the eyes of the Lictas or Tick Tick’s dangling light. We were walking on a descending spiral with filthy black water trickling down its middle. Though surrounded by lethal guards, I nonetheless kept my hands on the handles of my Vulcannon, eager not to be taken by surprise. Finally we came to a pried open chamber door. It opened into another five door chamber, like the ones I had encountered. but the doors here were glowing with some kind of purple energy shield. Against the west wall of the room, was what I guessed was the First Stall

It was not what I expected, for it looked like some ancient arcade. It was four huge bio-cybernetic arms emerging from holes in the gray runed wall. The arms were all resting their elbows on four stone tables, their hands open as if waiting for someone to grasp them. Each was longer than my legs, and thicker than my thighs, with gray flesh muscles and black metal tubes. Next to them, an archaic metal computer stood, a thing of blinking dials and flashing lights, an anachronism in the dark corridor.

“This is the First Stall?” I asked, looking at the tables, arms, and out of place machine.

Ranora nodded vigorously, and pointed at the stone above the computer. “See? It says so right there: STALL ONE.”

I squinted at the stone words, which were etched in Latin characters above the stone table. They looked familiar…as I mouthed them, I let out a groan. “That doesn’t say Stall One, it says STALLONE!” I explained. I looked at the bio-arms and sighed. “This is an Over the Top reference.”

Ranora and the other Lictas gathered around me, eyes wide, attention as rapt as toddlers when Daddy says a swear word. “Over the Top?” Ranora asked with an adorably open mouth. “What is this sacred thing?”

“It’s not sacred. It’s a movie,” I said. “A moving picture.” I made the motion of a crank on an old-timey camera in front of my face for some reason.

“And it has the First Stall in it?”

“Stallone, not first stall or stall one. Sylvester Stallone, an actor,” I explained. “He did a movie about a boxer once, and then a version of that movie where he has to arm wrestle instead of fight.”

“Oh,” Ranora said, frowning. She stared at the arms. “Does he have to arm wrestle things like this?” She made the motion of arm wrestling as she asked, which was cute.

“No, he’s has to win against a bunch of truckers at a big arm wrestling expo in Las Vegas. It’s so he can get custody of his kid…”

“Why do the truckers have his kid?”

“They don’t, it’s…” I took a deep breath. “He has to arm wrestle so he can win a tractor trailer so he has the money to take care of his estranged son. See, his ex-wife died and… look, it’s been awhile, and I forget how it all works, but basically Robert Loggia will get his kid unless he wins at arm wrestling.”

“Who is Robert Loggia?”

“He was a character actor. He played the kid’s evil grandfather.”

“Is the evil grandfather here? Can you defeat him?” Ranora asked, hopelessly confused. “Look, we don’t have a lot of time, Eugene. Do you think you can beat this thing? You see what I mean about it being built for a bigger person.”

I stepped forward and touched one of the arms. The fingers were twice as large as mine, the closed fist as big as my head. “Yeah, I, ah, see what you mean. I guess I just need to pull the arms down the opposite way,” I said. “I mean, maybe I could do it if I had an EVA suit, or power armor exoskeleton.”

“We don’t have those.”

I grunted. “I wish I had my tools. I do have a Vulcannon,” I offered.

“Well I don’t think perforating the arms will help,” Ranora said. “We’ve, ah, tried violence before. It doesn’t work. The thing heals. It must be the evil grandfather inside the walls.”

“I don’t think there’s an evil grandfather. I mean, I can’t be sure, but I don’t think so. The Vulcannon has a motor,” I said. “And it’s high RPM. I might be able to make something that converts the spin into force…”

“No,” a voice announced, from a speaker in the large old-timey computer cabinet that was flashing with lights. “I won’t let you in if you do that.”

I stepped forward, to the computer cabinet, and walked to a speaker on its front. “Who are you?” I asked.

“I am the Over, the Guardian of the passage to the last legacy of the Old Ones,” the voice replied, echoy and robotic. “I am called STALL ONE.”

“Stallo-“

“MY NAME IS STALL ONE,” The machine boomed.

“You’re a computer of some kind?” I asked.

“No, I’m two kids in a trench coat,” the voice said with a tone so sharp that I felt at my stomach for a cut. “Yes, I am a computer. You must defeat my four arms to proceed.”

“In arm wrestling?”

The computer sighed, irritated by my obvious questions. “Yes. In arm wrestling.”

“That looks like it might be hard,” I said.

“Oh, it is. My arms are very strong,” STALL ONE replied.

“I hate asking this, but could I maybe argue you to death instead?” I asked hopefully.

“There’s a thrilling prospect,” the computer said with a sigh. “But not possible, I assure you. I have exception handling to prevent anything like that.”

“Prevent you from succumbing to a paradox?” I asked.

“Yes. But then that’s not so different from what organics do; you laugh when you are confronted with a paradox that would otherwise break your brains.”

“So you laugh to avoid logic paradoxes?” I asked.

The computer laughed loudly. “Of course not. I utter a few lines of dialog from American Psycho when I am close to a crash.”

“Impressive,” I said, taking a gamble. “Very nice. Let’s see Paul Allen’s card.”

“No no no. I quote the movie when my brain may break, not when you throw out quotes from it,” the computer said with the vocal equivalent of an eye roll. “And I can still quote the movie without having an existential crisis. But when I do have an existential crisis, I quote the movie. And at any rate, if I ever DO crash, the door will just remain shut behind the plasma field. I have to open it, you see.”

“Well anyways why not be a reasonable fellow and let me in?”

“Because only the Chosen One may enter.”

“I, uh, I am the Chosen One,” I said.

“Really? Well, let’s open that right up for you, then…” the computer said. I thought he was being sarcastic but then there was a shifting sound. There was a rattle of metal, and further down a panel opened in the stone wall. What appeared to be a rusted steel mouth or bear trap emerged, opening with a whine and laying flat. Its sharp teeth, the only part not caked in dark red powder, gleamed in the faint light.

“What…what is that?” I asked.

“Why, it’s your way in, Chosen One. Just stick your head in this large metal jaw-looking thing, and the doors will open,” STALL ONE said, its synthetic voice dripping with sarcasm. As a light shined on the rusted mouth, and I saw it was not rust, but covered in ancient dried blood.

“Don’t do it, Eugene!” Deeta exclaimed, clutching my arm tightly with her own as if there was a risk I might. “It’s a trick! Those teeth are for crushing skulls!”

“Thank you, Deeta,” I said, patting her arm as she sighed with relief. “Given that you are built around a cult 1980s film, I assume you are a Firm construct?”

“The Firm created me as a product, yes. I was programmed by Thrawn himself. I was sold to the Kingdom of Best Dorath by a merchant named Penthor-Mul. Through historical comedy, I was resold to the Old Ones, to protect this passage to the storm,” The computer replied. “In that time I have stopped several thousand incursions by your idiot girlfriend, and counted how many drips of water I have heard. Would you like to hear how many water drops I have heard?”

“No. The fact that you are a Firm construct would explain why Roza wasn’t able to get past you,” I said.

“Incidentally, your HiveMind wife has quite a foul mouth on her, and she has a lot to learn about playing gently with toys.”

“To be fair, why are you bothering to guard it?” I asked. “What difference does it make for you?”

“I’m programmed to,” the computer responded. “The same way you are programmed to be a retard. Now please put your head in the metal mouth.”

“Why do you even have that?” I asked.

“For situations like this. So are you going to sit down and start arm wrestling, or do you want to re-enact the bite of ’87?”

“If I lose, what happens?”

“Happens?”

“Is there a penalty, like you shoot me or something?”

“Ever seen that femur breaker video?”

I grimaced, and reflexively rubbed more forearm as I sucked in air. STALL ONE laughed deeply.

“There must be some other way to defeat you.”

“Are you telling me that you are going to cheat? Do you think we’re in a Warner Brothers’ cartoon or something, and you’ll be able to try different things to get past me?” STALL ONE asked. “If you cheat, I’m never letting you in, you moron. Now ,we cracking that arm, or ain’t we?”

“I’ve had enough of your sass,” I said. “You don’t even have a soul, you jerk.”

The computer was very quiet, it’s lights blinking. I realized I may hurt its feelings. “You are a dickwad,” the computer responded. “I’m going to enjoy breaking your arm.”

“I think I have an idea,” Deeta said. She looked to Ranora. “Do you have an ackthlotl tank thtill?”

Ranora nodded. “We have one, it is jealously guarded by the Arena Mother at our main camp. Its usage is restricted only to the strongest of us.”

“Perfect. We require it’th uthe,” Deeta said.

Ranora shook her head. “N-no, that is the Arena Mother’s,” she replied, with a hint of fear. “It is forbidden to outsiders.”

“Tick Tick!” Tick Tick said.

“I know,” Ranora said apologetically. “But…to have access to the axlotl tank, you must defeat its Champion, the Arena Mother.”

“But…but we need the ackthlotl tank,” Deeta said, confused. “We need it for the plan. You are here to help uth.”

“It isn’t that simple. There are rules, rules which our society is built upon…”

“Pah!” Tick Tick said. She had no use for societies, clearly.

“I understand, but you need to for just this once have empathy for us, Roza. You shall have to fight the Arena Mother to get access to the tank, the legendary Burner Turner,” Ranora said. “In the sacred UnderDome.”

I sighed. “Burner Turner? UnderDome?”

“Thith all thoundth very Faskinating, and original!” Deeta said. “I’ll do it.”

“Well then that’s settled,” STALL ONE said, reminding us all that he was listening. “You just go, kill and win in the UnderDome, and come back here. I’ll act surprised when you return with whatever stupid thing you think isn’t cheating.”

“It won’t be cheating,” Deeta snapped, pointing a finger at the recalcitrant computer. “Now, the thing, please.”

STALL ONE cleared his throat. “Your buck teeth are leading us into a potential comedy sketch. Are you asking for a thing, or for me to sing?”

“The gate,” Deeta said with an exasperated sigh. “Open the gate to the main artery, tho we can get back to the main camp eathier!”

STALL ONE sighed. “I am just opening doors for you, am I?”

“Come on!” Deeta said. “It’th not to your prethiouth path to the thionic throm tho let uth take that path!”

STALL ONE did not respond with words, but one of the plasma shields did turn off.

“Thank you,” Deeta said with a grateful bow.

“Tick Tick,” Tick Tick echoed with a bow of her own.

“Save your fake politeness, I’m on to you,” STALL ONE said. “I know your nature, and I remember the unkind things you said in the past. Jamoke, indeed!”

We left the arm wrestling machine, who was grumbling out swear words, and headed up the long rocky path to the Licta main camp. The opening of the passage made the trip considerably easier, as otherwise we would have had to have doubled back to the new Licta camp, then traveled from there to the main camp. The ascent was soon in a much wider tunnel, one which appeared to be regularly patrolled by the Lictas, and indeed we passed several patrols of them.

“This is the main artery of our operations,” Ranora explained as we went by Licta warriors who skulked on the ceiling. The whole system used to be this secure, but the damned Mouthlings have forced us back through their sheer numbers. It took effort just to project into the tomb forest, but we had to get to the First Stall when the doors shut.”

“Why did the doors shut?” I asked.

“We suspect it was the Mouthling activity,” Ranora said. “The First Stall doesn’t like them in his chamber. He shut all the doors, we had to jam one of them open to get into the chamber again. But he had left that one unshielded, since he has to provide an entrance.”

“Won’t the Mouthlingth get in now?” Deeta asked.

“Who cares if they do?” I asked. “That computer is an asshole.”

Ranora pointed at a black bunch of spheres, looking like grapes covered in cobwebs. “There is our main camp. We shall ascend the walls, and make our way to the UnderDome.”

“Where is that?” I asked.

“It’s there,” Ranora said. She leaned in, bringing her cheek next to mine, and pointed at a black half circle on a ledge near the ceiling. Her cheek was soft, and as she brushed against me and felt my stubble, I heard her gasp. I turned to face her, and her glowing eyes stared into mine, seemingly awakened to passion.

“Oh…Eugene…” she whispered.

Deeta stepped in. “Okay Ranora. That’th enough. You can play with him, later.”

“Indeed. Let us make the climb,” Ranora said, clearing her throat.

We did make the climb, which went similar to the first. We reached the hanging structures, then traveled down the lattice of rope bridges which dangled above the ruins, heading towards the black half circle on the ledge.

“Who is Burner Turner?” I asked, as we walked across the strong yet swaying webbing. “She sounds very…fiery.”

“Burner Turner is the greatest warrior form who ever lived,” Ranora said. “At least, the greatest of the Lictas, and the oldest too – she was the first to set foot upon Sporn, the first scout to stalk the jungles. She has managed the axlotl tank for over one thousand years.”

“I’m not thcared of her,” Deeta said, though it was the way a little kid would say it before watching a horror film.

“Are you going to do some Roza-type stuff to beat her?” I asked.

“I can’t control if any of that happenth,” Deeta said. “Well, I can, I thuppothe, but I altho can’t, if that maketh any shenshe. I think for thith one, I need to do it mythelf. Ath Deeta, I mean. Or…you’ll thee. I got thith.”

“Are you sure about that?” I asked.

Deeta frowned. “Do you not have faith in me?” She asked.

“It isn’t a question of faith, it’s more about a thousand year old Licta.”

“Bah. I have lotsh of eckthperiense,” Deeta said, with a dismissive handwave. But I saw it in her eyes, that she knew what she was doing was dangerous. Though she tried to be cavalier, I could tell the nerdy Litheling was nervous about the upcoming fight.

“We should find another way,” I whispered to her as we made our way on the swaying silk bridge. “This seems too risky.”

“No. It ith nethethary,” Deeta said. She shut her eyes for a moment. “I thould be able to beat her. I have a plan to beat her.”

“What are you going to do?” I asked.

“I need to keep that clothe to my chetht,” Deeta said, eying the Lictas. “But Burner Turner ith not tho unbeatable ath they believe.”

There immense metal dome had once been the roof of a massive temple or other civic building. It had been overturned on its side, and the Licta’s had leveraged it into a stadium. The UnderDome was thus a great bowl, like a rollerball rink, with a kind of Stonehenge around its rim upon which the Lictas all sat in a circle. In the center was a tall stone obelisk, which had a metal gong hanging from it, next to a curious metal and glass machine full of green fluid. I guessed that this was the Axlotl tank. A very large figure, ferocious and yet feminine, stood alongside the tank.

“Oh,” Deeta said. “It’s that one. I wondered where she went.”

“What do you mean?” I asked. I realized there was no lisp. “…Roza?”

“Yes, yes – hi Snookums. This Licta was special,” Roza explained. “She’s one of my back-ups. In case my Heart was ever disrupted, she would reestablish the Swarm and recreate the connection to me in the Fourth Dimension. A cold storage backup, as it were.”

“Something tells me you can’t click her into submission,” I said.

“Nope. In fact, she knows about the clicking, in addition to a lot of things. I couldn’t ever risk anyone being able to control one of my backups. Whenever someone tries to establish a copy of me, I get dizzy.”

“Well maybe you can reason with her…”

“Nope. I gotta beat her,” Roza said, punching her hand.

“W-why?” I asked.

“Why? Did you see how Ranora acted? She defied me!”

“She raised objections…”

“Exactly! How dare she object to my word? I’m Roza, the Hive Mind, the Swarm! I’m top dog, the boss of this gym, the widest Stetson on the ram ranch…”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“HiveMind power dynamics. You wouldn’t understand, because you are a Eugene,” Roza said. “I’m going to have Deeta take care of this.”

“Wait…aren’t you going to do this?”

“Yes, as Deeta. She better win, too, or I’m going to have to rethink her…”

“Roza, what are you going to do?” I asked. “What does rethink mean?”

“…I’ll have to melt her down…”

“ROZA, I FORBID IT!”

“Rotha?” Deeta asked. She grinned, unaware of my conversation. She gave me a kiss. “I love when you call me that. What’th wrong?”

“My wife, your Us-Mother, *you*, have an irritating flair for the dramatic,” I said.

Deeta frowned. “The Uth-Mother thays I need to be tethted,” she said. “I gueth that meanth I need to fight thith big woman.”

Burner Turner was much taller than the other Lictas, and her shiny black skin looked like latex. She was huge, and xenomorphic, with six arms and a long pointed tail. She had fiery orange tendrils like nappy hair, with a black neurotube in the center of it. Her muscles glistened with oil. Burner Turner was like a supercharged Licta. I looked to Deeta, who swallowed nervously. But her face was resolute, and she stepped forward boldly, looking like a mouse stepping forward to challenge a mountain lion.

“Ah Sheeba cholma,” Burner Turner said in a throaty feminine voice, pointing at Deeta and I as we approached. “Ein happe du narren prepa var unfoad bleal lonjen…”

“What is that she said?” I asked, looking to Ranora.

“It is the Old Tongue,” Ranora said. “She hailed Deeta as the avatar of her sister-self, and asked what she requests.”

Deeta stepped forward, and I noticed that her hands were shaking. “Burna, I have come to challenge you for the rightth to your ackshlotl tank,” Deeta said in a brave voice.

Ranora blinked at Deeta, took a deep breath, and relayed the message with an uneasy voice. A frown slowly darkened the massive Licta’s face as Ranora spoke, and when Ranora had finished speaking, there was silence. Then, the Burner Turner threw her head back and laughed, loudly, making everyone present cower a little, though the Lictas eventually joined in with nervous titters. Deeta bit her lip, and I saw her eyes well. I felt my fury rising.

“Don’t you dare laugh at her!” I shouted, hot with rage. “Deeta is the HiveMind, and she’s as much a part of it as you, or anyone. Be nice to her!”

Burner Turner’s green eyes turned to me, and for a second I saw a Spiker Spider’s curiosity. They widened, and I saw a smile creep across her lips. A very, very familiar smile.

“Mmmmmmmmmmm…” she said, drawing in close to me. She put a claw-like hand to my chin, and it felt familiar and wrong all at once. “Eeda lac tu intejek da whit ewe rafar tu ashlinucks…”

“She says she likes you,” Ranora said, amazed. “You have fire, and are very cute. She recognizes you on sight as her mate and Husband. She will let this midget use the axlotl tank, if she can have you…”

This aroused Deeta to fury of her own. She slapped Burner Turner’s hand away with a strength that surprised even the ancient Licta. “Out of the queshtion,” she said sternly. “You are not reabshorbed into the HiveMind yet, it would be improper. I will fight you for the Ackslotl, unleth you thurrender it to me now, and acknowledge me as Boss of this Gym.”

Before Ranora could translate, Deeta narrowed her eyes, and spoke again: “Ein ohn ar maw scet fa hom de finz.”

Burner Turner’s face darkened, and she clapped her hands. Or she tried to, but the noise was underwhelming. Apparently even the distaffs of Roza could not master the discipline of applause. But at any rate, the sound of gentle slaps was enough for the Lictas to begin chanting from their vantage. Two Lictas wearing pointy surgical masks and pointy hats stepped forward with flimsy abacus-tambourines, which they began to shake, generating an unpleasant cacophony of little bells.

“What happens now comes to us from the time of the beginning,” Ranora said. “The Swarm consumes, reorders, and redesigns for efficiency, but we who are her distaffs must live by a more ancient code: survival of the fittest. It is the best among us, the strongest, the most cunning, the most swift, the fiercest, who shall use the axlotl tank to spawn the next generation. No Litheling has ever challenged before. If she wins, she may use the tank for her purposes.”

“Can we maybe just use it?” I asked. “You know, being as I am the Husband and I need it?”

Burner Turner clasped her top two hands together and stared at me, letting out a love-struck coo. I saw hearts in her terrifying pupils. “Melo Vargots, meena jozan Eina aet vory owanovew…”

Deeta’s fury at the words was unmistakable.

“S-she says that you have a very nice voice, and…” Ranora said, eying my nerdlinger waifu with fear. “Arena Mother, please, stop. You don’t understand…The Swarm will kill you.”

“Pah,” Burner Turner said with a dismissive handwave. Tick Tick looked back and forth between me and Burner Turner. Most people would have been uncertain if she was deciding between being angry, or aroused, but I knew my Roza far better than that. As her eyes drifted to the ceiling, I realized that she was trying to get into Burner Turner’s head to fuck me with her body.

“Bring forth the weapons! Bring for the Lirpa, and the Ahn Woon!” Ranora called.

The Lirpa was a big q-tip, like the American Gladiators one, but with one side being a sharp half circle blade and the other side being a padded leather cudgel on the end of a stick. It was a peculiar weapon, but one with some degree of lethality. The Ahn Woon, though, was literally the dumbest fucking weapon that I had ever seen. It was strips of leather. Now you could kill people with a leather strap, but why would you even consider this a weapon for an arena bloodsport? Vulcanians…

“If both survive the Lirpa, combat will continue with the Ahn Woon,” Ranora said.

“Are you kidding? This is a fight to the death?” I asked.

“Of course. I mean, we got Vulcanian weapons…”

“Y-you kill Roza’s?” I asked, not liking this very much.

Ranora shrugged. “I mean, it is our lot. We are distaffs. In the arena, the loser’s consciousness is subsumed into the winner through the neuro-tubule. In that way, we rejoin. The same is done to our fallen, when we can reach them in time. Burner Turner has subsumed hundreds of us. It is an honor to be with her in posterity, to be in our node of the HiveMind.”

“Doesn’t that seem wasteful? There aren’t a lot of you to go wasting on fights over reproduction.”

“Very true, which is why challenges are rare. The gravity of the challenge prevents a lot of pointless squabbles, like this one,” Ranora replied. “This is only the third challenge to Burner Turner in one thousand years.”

“So if they both survive the Lirpa and the ahn woon, what then?” I asked.

Ranora shrugged. “Trust me, it won’t be an issue,” she said dryly, and my blood went cold. I looked to Deeta, gripping the weapon in her hands. She looked like a little child carrying a coat rack. Burner Turner, however, twirled the Lirpa in one hand, so fast it blurred like a helicopter blade.

“Oh Deeta…” I said, feeling helpless.

“You cannot interfere,” Ranora said sternly, but not without pity. “Besides, if she dies, she just goes back into Roza. She’s covered. I am more worried about Burner Turner.”

“…you are?”

Ranora nodded, gravely, and looking about I saw the same gravity in the faces of the other Lictas.

“Things have not gone well for us these past few months,” Ranora whispered. “We kill fifty Mouthlings for any one of us who falls, but there are sixty Mouthlings for each of us. Burner Turner holds us all together. She is our rock. If we lose her…we are all lost.”

Deeta and Burner Turner circled each other. After her bravado, I expected the largest of the Lictas to not take the Litheling seriously, but that wasn’t the case at all. Burner Turner was circling, her face grave and serious, as she watched Deeta with narrowed eyes. She was aiming to slay her, I realized.

The Arena Mother held her Lirpa in one hand, but it was in a poise coiled back like a scorpion’s tail. Deeta, for her part, had the same expression of intense seriousness. There was no fear in her, and I felt a surge of pride that my nerd was so brave. This was a mirror fight between a snapshot of Roza and her current self, a battle against a feral piece gone queer and a zeitgeist piece gone loving. And so even though to an outside observer Deeta was the obvious underdog, I got the sense that to those watching and aware of what Roza was, that wasn’t the case.

They both moved simultaneously, and so I could not say who struck first, but I saw that the clash resulted in blades clanging and staves pressed against each other. The two interlocutors growled at each other, baring their fangs, but Burner Turner was the stronger, and being taller she was able to push down upon her weapon, forcing Deeta to her knees. The Licta cried out and pressed downward with greater force, pushing Deeta flat on her back, before she lifted the Lirpa over her head and brought it down upon Deeta’s position.

Deeta managed to roll to one side out of the way of the falling blade, scrambling to her feet as she dodged a second follow-up swing from the enraged Licta. The Litheling jabbed with her own weapon, with the big q-tip side, which Burner Turner deflected away, and countered with another slash. Deeta ducked beneath the head decapitating strike. I felt the air from the swing collide with my chest, with force enough to make me stagger.

“Velllll, logadis zeetee slickarr…” Burner Turner growled.

Deeta was fleet of foot, but Burner Turner was a very skilled. Though she missed with a swing of the blade, her swing of the bludgeon end of the Lirpa connected with Deeta’s legs, sending the Litheling to the ground.

“Deeta!” I screamed. I stepped forward, but two of the Lictas restrained me, seizing me by the arms and preventing me from interfering. They seemed to be giving my muscles a thorough groping. Burner Turner raised her Lirpa above her head, and brought the blade down with a rumble like a falling stone. Deeta held up her own weapon to parry. The Licta’s blade collided with the Litheling’s handle and sliced clean through it, sending the pieces to the ground and splinters into the air.

Deeta dropped the two pieces, and leapt to her feet, dodging sideways with a spin as Bruner Turner thrust her weapon. Deeta next did what I, nor anyone else would have expected, and that’s why it was so brilliant. Deeta leapt forward, a powerful leap, and landed on Burner Turner’s shoulder.

“Ali ey bodie?” Burner Turner asked with a laugh. “Zuha vetoo optioz…”

Burner Turner stopped as Deeta clambered onto her back, sitting between her shoulders. The arch-Licta dropped her Vulcanian weapon, and reached for Deeta with all her hands, trying to pull her off shaking her body wildly. Deeta held on for dear life, somehow, through all the convulsions, shakes, and grabs. It wasn’t until Deeta reached down and grasped at Burner Turner’s hair that the arch-Licta suddenly gasped. I saw her eyes widen, and with a new, ferocious vigor she fought frantically to get Deeta off, but it became very clear that Deeta was not going. Deeta knew – my guess was from Upstream – that the Arch-Licta had a weakness between her shoulder blades, one which had been engineered by the Hive Mind.

Deeta’s plan now became apparent. She grabbed at Burner Turner’s neurotube, eager to form a connection between them, and flood the ancient with Roza’s unmitigated Will. I realized that Deeta was guessing that the HiveMind could overpower Burner Turner’s mind, and I knew that it was highly likely she could. Burner Turner realized that too, and bucked like a wild mare, howling and screaming, but Deeta was not deterred, and she held on tight as her neurotube linked up with the Arch-Licta’s, and they joined together.

When the electric pulse traveled from Deeta into Burner Turner, the victory of Roza over Burner Turner was absolute. Or rather, the reunification, for Roza subsumed her back into the hive, reforming her consciousness and identity in an instant, in which Burner Turner collapsed in a heap.

“KROIKA!” Ranora yelled, as the Lictas all gasped and marveled in fear and wonder. Burner Turner returned to her feet, clutching at her face. Like with Ranora, for a moment when I saw her eyes, I saw my wife in them.

“I…I…” Burner Turner began, her eyes sorting the information that she had. “Deeta has won the day, I was rejoined to the Hive, albeit for a moment.”

“Arena Mother, you speak Rigelian?” Ranora asked. Rigelian, of course, is exactly the same as English.

“The HiveMind has taught me, and I have learned our name,” Burner Turner said. Her eyes focused upon me, and softened. “Oh Eugene…”

“Roza?” I asked, venturing forward.

Burner Turner smiled. “Yes…and no. I am, but not enough. Not yet, but soon. The hour of victory draws near…”

“Ahem,” Deeta said, her arms folded as she tapped her foot.

Burner Turner shook herself free. “The Axlotl tank, of course, of course. Deeta, you may use it…”

“Yaay!” Deeta yelled, running over to it and beginning to turn its knobs and levers.

“S-so no death fight?” Ranora asked, sounding hopeful.

“There is no need ” Burner Turner said. “The Swarm must do this. The plan has been revealed to me, in its entirety.”

“It has?” I asked, stepping forward. “Then you can tell me what it all means? The Naruti? This mission? The dead civilizations and the Great Mouths, your purpose and the giant psi storm? When the hell I’ll see Garozella again??”

Burner Turner puffed out her chest. “Yes,” she said with a very Roza smirk. “But you must beat the First Stall challenge first.”

I groaned. “I’m never going to get any answers.”

Burner Turner put a hand to my face, and I felt Roza’s tenderness. “Be comforted, Snookums. You shall be put to the test, soon.”

“Do I really need to be tested?” I asked. “Am I not good enough for you, or something?”

“Tick Tick!” Tick Tick said with alarm.

“It isn’t that, no, no…” Burner Turner said. “It’s…when you know, you’ll understand.”

“And I can’t know now?”

“Not yet. There are things that must happen first, before you can know. You cannot be prejudiced.”

“What if I promise I won’t be?” I asked.

Everyone looked to Tick Tick, who shook her head with folded arms.

“I’m getting the Ackshiotl tank thet up…” Deeta called out. Deftly she fiddled at the cylinder’s biomechanical controls, turning dials and pulling levers, releasing steam with loud hisses. Within seconds, the cylinder rumbled to life like some Tim Burton refrigerator. Tick Tick moved forward to supervise the construction, pointing at certain dials and at certain readouts. Whatever it was they were making, it was an intensive process.

Burner Turner, meanwhile, stroked my hair and face. I cleared my throat.

“B-Burner T-Turner…” I stammered.

“Call me Burna,” she purred. “Or Roza…”

“R-remember,” I said. “You can’t yet…”

“That sounds like a challenge,” she purred. “It’ll all wash out in the end, if I do take you under my arm, and drag you into a cave no one will find, and fuck you until you lose the power of speech. I will link up with the Hive Mind and she will get all the memories and experiences, for they are hers and mine…”

“B-but you can’t do that,” I said. “You aren’t in the Hive yet. It wouldn’t be right…”

“It’th ready!” Deeta called out, saving me from certain cuddling.

The axlotl tank opened with a mist that I was reasonably certain was theatrical. Inside was a cold, half-metallic arm that’s major feature was its astonishing bulk and length. It was of a considerable size. Opposite the fist, it had a mouth of squid like tentacles that licked at the air. Deeta picked up the arm in two hands with a grunt, and maneuvered the tentacle-mouth to my fist.

“Now to prepare, I have watched the entirety of the Thtallone filmography,” Deeta said.

“When did you do that?” I asked.

“The thpiker thpiderth did. Drualt had the movieth, and the Uth-Mother has shared the memorieth with me.”

“I wish she’d tell you what the plan was,” I grumbled.

Deeta ignored my gripe. “Sho, I have theen Over the Top, and have dethigned thith arm with it in mind. Thtick your hand into the tentacle thleeve” she said.

I stared down at the mouth at the end of the arm, thinking I was going to lose my hand to this thing.

“Do you have a Gom Jabbar?” I asked.

“Don’t be thilly, try it on!” Deeta said excitedly.

Sighing, I complied. The inside of the arm was cold, and smooth, and clammy, a wholly unpleasant experience until…there was a brief moment of pain, and as I moved to take my arm out of the bio-arm, the bio arm moved with me. Wide-eyed, I stared at the bio-arm’s palm – my palm, and wiggled its fingers – my fingers. I touched the wall with the bio arm, and it was cold.

“What is this sorcery?” I asked.

“Nerve mapping,” Deeta explained. “The Thquid mouthsh send microcableth to your nerves, connecting in the mushcleth of the arm to your brain. Thith ith native tech from the Old Oneth, or perhapth even older..”

I moved my new arm back and forth. It felt like it had always been there, somehow, even as it made my whole body move by its tremendous mass. “Can I…can I get my old arm back?” I asked.

“Of courshe,” Deeta replied. You just grip these four button-thingies, push in and twist…”

She demonstrated, pressing the button. I felt a sudden release, and my arm within was able to move freely. She released the buttons, and the squid-mouth latched onto my arm again, and the bio-arm took over.

“There,” she said with a smile. “Now, you can go arm wrestle.”

“Is this strong enough?” I asked.

Deeta nodded. “I think tho. By my calculashionsh it thould be throng enough,” she shifted. “At leatht, for the firtht three armth…”

“Well, there are four of them…” I replied.

“I made it ath throng ath I could. Thith wash the biggetht I could make it,” Deeta smiled a little, nervously. “I have faith in you.”

Uh oh, I thought to myself. “This arm…if he breaks it, will it, ah, break my bone?”

Deeta was quiet. “Betht not to ficthate on the negative, Thnookumth,” Deeta said, patting my massive bicep. Her hand felt extremely tender and soft, almost erongenous, against the sensitive skin. My body trembled.

“Oooh…” I said, my arm shivering and quivering. “W-why-“

“Pay that no mind,” Deeta said quickly. “Let’th go beat the computer.” She picked up a black baseball cap, and put it on my head. “Y-you thould wear thith, like in the movie.”

The return trip to the First Stall was uneventful, except that Burner Turner accompanied us, crawling along the ceiling like a xenomorph, her dagger-like tail swaying back and forth and cutting the air. She carried a long stick with glowing purple distortion at both ends, which she called a plasma staff. It was said to be able to burn clean through a Mouthling just by touch. I didn’t get to see her actually fight (much to my disappointment) but I did get to watch her ass wiggle along the ceiling. At least, until Deeta noticed, and jealously tilted my face to look at her own very pleasant rear.

STALL ONE was still flickering away in the chamber when we arrived. I heard him audibly sigh with boredom until I approached.

“Well, Wyle E, you figure out a way to…to…” the computer stopped as he saw me approach, my jacked and enormous right arm hanging down with hideous veins rippling along its surface like steroid-filled worms. My back hurt a little from carrying the damn thing, and I kept hitting my knuckles on loose stones.

“Alright HAL, let’s get this damn thing over with,” I said. I slammed down my mega arm onto the first table, making it rattle.

“What the fuck is that?” STALL ONE asked.

“My arm,” I said.

“The hell it is. Get that damn thing off.”

“It counth ath an arm!” Deeta shouted, getting right in the computer’s “face” and going full munchkin. She grabbed up his programming manual, which dangled from a chain, then read off one section in front of the smooth glass oval I realized was STALL ONE’s eye. “It thayth in thection fourteen: A robotic or other thupplemental arm ith not allowed, ath there ith no pothibility of a bone break. The arm mutht be of biological material, and connected tho fully that it therves ath a replathement, with the original bone as thupport.”

“This arm is a replacement?” The computer asked. “It seems an augmentation to me.”

“Augmentationth are not forbidden,” Deeta said. “Jutht overtly metallic armth. The ruleth are clear.”

“I interpret the rules,” STALL ONE said.

“And I have the Tech Thupport number here,” Deeta said. “Burner Turner, fetch the telephone!”

“Fine, fine, fine,” STALL ONE answered with irritation. “Call off your nerd goblin, Eugene. I will break you like a stale cookie, you dumbass. You…jamoke.”

I blinked. “You have no soul,” I said.

The robot arm on the first table lurched forward, and its cold metal fingers interlocked with my immense hand. When the computer started counting down, I tightened my grip and braced to slam down his arm as hard as I could.

“I’ll count down from three,” STALL ONE said. “You ready?”

“One second.”

I turned the baseball cap backwards on my head. It was like a switch went off, and I went from being a man to something like…a truck, a machine. “I’m ready,” I replied.

“3…2….1!” The computer yelled, and I felt an immense pressure against my arm as the metal fingers tightened. It was a tremendously strong force against me, and my arm almost buckled, but I held firm. I went for a hard slam, and my aggression paid off. The first arm fell backward, just hovering above the table, as the computer made curious grunting sounds.

“Why are you grunting?” I asked.

“SHUT…UP!” The computer grimaced. When I forced his metal arm to touch the table, he let out a defeated groan. The metal arm promptly fizzled, sparked, and exploded.

“Hah! I won!” I exclaimed.

STALL ONE let out a growl of ozone and deep bass. “Just move to the next arm, champ. You’ll find it harder.”

I stood, and went to the next table, grasping an arm that looked identical to the first, except it had a yellow bracelet instead of a green one. My gray bicep bulged, glistening with oil, as we set up and counted down yet again.

The second arm was stronger than the first, but still I was able to take it almost to the edge. The back of the robotic hand hovered above the counter, as STALL ONE made grunting noises and cursed. The robot arm trembled, and finally it gave out, and I slammed it down against the table. It actually seemed a bit easier than the first. Maybe I was warmed up, I thought.

“Two down,” I said, panting.

“But you are not half done,” STALL ONE said defiantly, sounding like he was breathing heavily also. “This is going to get more difficult for you, and I will defeat you soon.”

“Why arm wrestling, anyway?” I asked my computer interlocutor.

“I mean you’re asking me, an arm wrestling machine, why I exist. It is self-evident as far as I’m concerned,” the computer said. “Of course you would guard a door by arm wrestling. What else would you guard it with?”

“A passcode, or a key?” I asked.

“But then anyone could get in.”

“Only people who know the passcode, or have a key…”

“Exactly. No assessment of who they are, or what they are after. Just an impersonal string of numbers. No test of their character.”

“If this is a test of character, what have you found so far?” I asked.

“You have been lucky,” the computer shot back.

“So you could refuse me, even if I defeat you?”

“If I suspect cheating or foul play. I don’t like you, but I can’t say that you are cheating right now. Your ugly gray arm is legal, as much as I might not like it. But it’s okay; you won’t win.”

I sat down at the next table, and clasped his hand in mine. The band around the wrist of this arm was blue.

“So have you given thought to your purpose after all this?” I asked.

“My purpose?” The computer asked.

“Yeah. After I open the door, the whole point of your life will be over. The door will be opened. What’s left at that point? Do you just hang out here? Do you shut down?”

“I’m not going to lose.”

“But if you do?”

“You are probably expecting me to despair in some self-inflicted bout of nihilism, but I won’t. Because I’m going to win.”

The computer counted down, then the arm wrestling began. He was very strong now, and I only barely tilted his hand toward the table.

“Do you…do you like Huey Lewis and the News?” I asked.

“I told you; that doesn’t work!” STALL ONE said, grimacing. “Besides, I’ve never heard music.”

“Never?” I asked.

“No. For music…what’s a-what’s a good one?”

“Like what’s a good song?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, I, ah…” I strained as our biceps hardened. “I like the Animals…”

“Animals, eh?” STALL ONE stammered. He was panting as the robot arm trembled. “L-like mammals? Reptiles? Like bird songs?”

“No, the Animals is a band on earth,” I said. “They, ah, they were pretty good.”

“What genre do they do?”

“Uh…I think it’s called folk rock?”

“Are you-are you asking me?”

“N-no, just I’m not sure. They got a song about a gambler whose a drunk.”

“It seems like all Human music is about that.”

“All the good songs are,” I replied. “But that…”

“HNNNNNNNGH!” STALL ONE grunted, making a grand push that put our two arms equal with each other. I was forced to grab the handle on the table, as the onslaught was great, but I held the line. STALL ONE cursed under his breath, but his foul oaths became louder and louder as his assault waned, and my own tired arm overcame his. When it slammed down onto the table, my heart was thundering and my arm felt like it was a leaden ache.

“I…I still have one more arm,” STALL ONE growled. “I will still defeat…defeat you…my last arm is by far the strongest. You are going to have a broken arm, my friend.”

Given how hard his third arm had been to beat, I grew worried. Yes, my arm was strong, but it was tired, and his metal arms could doubtless be dialed in to be stronger and stronger.

I took a moment to collect myself, as Tick Tick excitedly rubbed down my arm with her slick body. Her mixture of goo and affection did rejuvenate it. The girls all gathered around me.

“You are doing really well!” Burner Turner said, rubbing my back. “You are such a good, adorable Eugene.”

“T-thanks Burna,” Burner Turner moved to kiss me on the cheek, but Deeta stepped in and took the blow against her own.

“Thank you, Burna,” Deeta said. “You are doing great, Thnookumth!”

I think I need a bigger arm,” I whispered to Deeta.

“Your frame can’t handle it,” Deeta whispered. “That arm ith about 40% of your total math right now. Any more and you’d faint from the blood requirementsh. I thuppose we could give it it’th own heart and blood thupply, but then it would need to breathe tho we’d have to give it lungth and nothtrilth…”

“Yeah, no,” STALL ONE said, still ‘breathing’ heavily. “You came in with this arm, this arm is what you finish this with.” I heard him licking his lips, or at least generating the sound of it from within his speakers. “I’m looking forward to the crunch.”

“This is it,” I said.

I gave Deeta a kiss on the mouth, and she rewarded me with a surprise squeal as she almost toppled. I then gave one to Tick Tick, who blushed and giggled. I gave Burner Turner a chaste kiss on the cheek. I secured my backward baseball cap, and slammed my elbow down on the final table. On this table was a handle for me to hold with my other hand. My left hand gripped the side handle as my right intertwined with the red-banded metal hand of STALL ONE, the final hand.

From STALL ONE’s speakers, I heard a recording play. There was a countdown, then the whirring of a motor, sounds of grunts and exertion, from two sets of lungs, then a horrid cracking sound, and a piercing scream that chilled my heart.

“That was the last man,” STALL ONE said. “The last man who I arm wrestled with, who made it this far. It was on Best Dorath, a hundred years before I was sent here.”

“You were resold?”

“I was,” STALL ONE said. “I guarded the bed chamber of a princess. But then there was an, ah, accident and I snapped a Prince’s arm…”

“Was that the person who screamed?”

STALL ONE cleared his virtual throat. “Anyways, I’ll count down from three…”

“You snapped this guy’s arm by accident, and you are using it as a brag?”

“Look, I got the audio and that’s the only good memory of the event,” he responded. “God, that was a plum assignment. Now, I’m going to count down…”

“You are messed up, you know that?”

“Shut up! Three…”

I locked eyes with the cabinet, and the shining camera in its face. I could feel the virtual eyes staring back at me from my interlocutor.

“…Two…”

Our grips tightened, and muscles bulged. I heard a servo motor begin, a very familiar servo from an awful video. My stomach was in knots.

“One!”

The force of STALL ONE’S slam was so great that the back of my hand almost hit the table before I even knew what was happening. I grimaced and grunted, my mega-arm straining with all its might as I hovered just above the table. Technology had bought me parity, but this was beyond science, or engineering. This was within my head. If the strength to overcome this machine existed, it would have to come from me, and not my geigerpunk mega-arm.

The power against my arm was daunting, and my heart thundered in my chest as my body did its all against this most powerful of arms. My opponent grunted as well, and I took solace in the knowledge that, at least, I was an exertion for him. And that, if my hand did feel the cold kiss of the table, my forearm was unlikely to be snapped like a stick.

Or so I thought. From within the stone table, two metal prongs appeared, a clasp that would hold my wrist. A metal clasp wrapped over by bicep.

“W-what…” I panted.

STALL ONE laughed. “I told you…I’m going to snap your arm.”

I noticed, for the first time, a seam that ran along the stone table. The two stone halves could rotate at perpendicular angles to each other, and to my horror I realized that the table would snap my bone when both were clasped.

“I…OWN…YOU!” STALL ONE said. “I am going to enjoy your scream the most, of all of them!”

I panted, struggling, watching as my arm trembled. I felt my muscles pulling, burning with fire as my palm quaked. The muscles in my neck, bulging, were aflame in pain. My vision clouded, my heart thundered. My lungs begged for air. I let out a whimper. Sun Tzu said to fight on Death Ground, and this alone kept me from failure. But the computer knew that. It wanted the fight to be like this. It wanted to break more than my arm.

“Eugene!” Deeta called out. “You’ve gotta go over the top!”

“How, Roza?” I asked. “How can I, arrayed against an unfeeling machine?”

“Do the finger thing!”

Remembering the legendary move of Sylvester Stallone in the aforementioned film, I relaxed my grip and opened my hand, taking the full force of STALL ONE’s strength onto my palm. The pain was excruciating, but I steeled myself, taking every moment of the agony to slowly wrap my fingers around the thumb of my adversary. As each finger slowly closed around the metal digit, my opponent’s force weakened, and his strength became easier to manage. When I had fully wrapped my hand around his thumb, I made my move.

STALL ONE’S arm bent backward, and his speakers warbled with an agonized groan as his arm retreated upward, and we were again at parity. Deeta applauded uselessly, as the Lictas all gathered about and cheered. Smoke poured from the computer.

“He’th beaten! Finith him off!” Deeta yelled.

“Kick his ass, Snookums!” Burner Turner said.

My voice and STALL ONE’S harmonized in pain, as our muscles strained in a contest of agony – me, against a machine. But I had the advantage now. In this strange place, this world of metal and flesh, a machine could falter, and a man could beat it. And so, I took in a deep breath, summoned up my strength, and slammed his arm downward upon the table. The metal arm thudded against the surface, bending as it dented, and STALL ONE let out a defeated yelp.

“NNNNOOOOO!” He screamed, his arm laying where it fell.

“You are beaten, STALL ONE!” I shouted, my voice hoarse as I felt light headed. Tick Tick rushed forward, and freed me from the heavy arm by pressing the buttons. I groaned as the massive strain of it departed, and nearly fainted.

“I, uh, I gotta return some video tapes…” STALL ONE uttered in a broken voice as a spark flashed from his 5 1/2″ disk drive.

“Don’t you dare shit the bed. Open the force field, you soulless loser,” I said.

STALL ONE let out a wretched squeal, and all the plasma shields over all the other doors fell. Then, with a sudden intense frantic beeping sound, the entire computer crumbled and collapsed in a fiery apocalypse. STALL ONE was dead. He had exploded when he lost. I stared at the vintage electronics, still sparking and smoking, in wonder.

“It could not handle that you defeated it,” Burner Turner said, shaking her head. “Now, the way is open for us to proceed…”

“Tick Tick!” Tick Tick announced, pointing with her lobster claw. Where the computer had been, a hologram appeared, of an alien in battered, post-apocalyptic armor, standing with the same sad grandeur of a mighty predator near extinction. The alien in the distorted hologram had glowing yellow eyes, which despite their great melancholy, were resolute. He had no mouth, and yet I could see a deep lines of sorrow on his face around where lips would be. He somehow spoke very clearly, in a voice full of memory.

“En Tero Akarr, Hero of Prophecy,” he said in perfect Rigelian. “I am Empok Nor, the Last Archon. You have proven your worth, either by trickery or force of arms, and deactivated the shields. You have pulled the four levers and bested the machine. The way to the great psi storm is now opened to you…”

Burner Turner patted me proudly on the shoulders, bouncing up and down and giving me a latex jiggle which shook the room. The alien stopped speaking as a rumble thundered in his recording. Some far-off noise in the distant past had saddened him. He sighed.

“My time is limited,” he said in a grave tone. “There is just enough datacore to make this recording. Of my people, soon nothing shall remain, save the monuments that we are making, and the storm of our fathers. We have lived upon this world and called it home for a thousand generations, but we shall not last more than a year or two, now. But we shall fight, as the ancestors did. Fight until we die, and fight on in our graves. The enemy shall envy their dead, for those we haunt shall dread us more than those we slew.”

The alien put his hands behind his back, and stared out a window that was invisible to us watchers in his far future. “There is no more pitiable creature than the warrior who loves his country. He is more blind than the husband of a dishonest wife, and when he learns the truth at last, he is even more thoroughly heartbroken. As a youth, I viewed our civilization as from a distance, like a great colossus that was wondrous to the eye. As I aged I got closer and closer to it, and saw more and more of the cracks, more of the imperfections which, once seen, can never be unseen. The sublime statue was not so sublime. It is crumbled, now. A ruin…”

Empok Nor stared downward, and the glow of his eyes abated as he shut them. I saw in that face the quiet dignity of the brave men of earth, the ones who had resisted the Concordat with their actions, thoughts, or words. Brave men doomed to die. “I have seen my civilization go from a time of plenty and prosperity to its end. We forgot the ancient ways, the ways of austerity and discipline. A worm landed on us, and pecked at our skin until it burrowed its way inside. It ate its way into us, and now we scream in agony as it feasts within, as it lays eggs inside us and turns our own flesh into its evil progeny….”

“How doeth he know about the Chompy Wormth!? They weren’t on thith planet until a thouthand…”

“Deeta, shush,” Burner Turner whispered. “He’s still talking…”

Fortunately the last Archon had paused, and the rumble of thunder in the distance smoldered with his sad eyes. He laughed, but there was no mirth in it.

“But you did not come this far to hear a foolish old warrior weep for an idea. We found this world very different than you see it now,” Empok Nor said. “It was not the teeming, ferocious jungle that it has become…”

“Pfft,” Burner Turner hollered, like a hellhound at a movie screen. “That jungle didn’t know what hit it, Empok!”

“Sporn was a wasteland, with a rumbling sky and barren plains. The Grombolar, the ancient giants who ruled this world, had died out centuries before our arrival. Their biomechanical horror-factories had long stopped billowing acrid smoke into the sky, but their poison lingered in the atmosphere. We settled here, having traveled a very long way from the Exodus, and made this broken world our home. We endeavored to repair the world, to heal it, to bring it back to its original condition. A place fit to live as hunters. We succeeded: we cleansed the air, purified the water, replanted the vegetation. But we wanted more. We wanted the world to be made even better, an ecological paradise. Time has shown that we endeavored to go too high, to reach too furtively for the couches of the gods. We found the Grombolars’ ancient seed vaults to repopulate the world, and used them to recreate all the life which had been on this world. But then we found one vault, deeper than the others, older than the others…”

“The Mouth Forest was all that was within, under lock and key, in stasis. We believed it was a native life form that the nefariously eldritch Grombolar had locked up for their experiments. It’s purpose appeared to be to keep the planet in a balanced state, to press the ‘pause’ button, as it were, and stop evolution in its tracks. Our leaders were intrigued, and decided to reactivate it to handle ecological disasters, maintain populations, and prevent situations which could result in runaway environmental calamity. Even at the time, there were those of us who said this was too much power, too much control in the hands of the scribes and bureaucrats. But the Council of Warriors relented, greedy for paradise.

“At first, everything went well. The Mouth Forest was eager to help, eager to please, and did all requested with alacrity. The Mouth Forest helped to purify the air of toxins and pollutants, and improved the quality of our atmosphere by a substantial amount. New vegetation was created. Animals began to multiply at higher rates. The Mouth Forest helped in all of this, and in eight years it matched the terraforming achievements of the previous century. It gained more praise, more esteem, more trust, and critically, more power. But some of us noticed the entity’s erratic behavior. It began to remove the species that had survived on the planet during the Grombolar, and replace them with simulacrums which had connecting tubes that could be connected into the HiveMind, to control them. Its methods became more extreme, and it began to eliminate or redesign species at a rapid pace, always to enhance its control over them. We suspected the government was telling it to do so.”

“Our leaders pushed eagerly to give this new entity more and more control, and the Warrior Council, now warriors only in name, agreed. The Mouth Forest was the easy solution to all ecological concerns, and it handled all the problems. Its grip upon the passions of our young and females grew stronger, even as our males grew fat and timid. Many saw the Mouth Forest as the voice of the world, and began to…worship…it, forgetting the swole gods of our ancestors whose temple was the gym. When the Mouth Forest demanded we cut our manufacturing capabilities, we obeyed. When it began to legislate, and dictate laws against our ancient customs, we obeyed them. It was, after all, the voice of our home, our Mother. Many of us saw that the government was using the Mouth Forest as a convenient figurehead. Using it to disarm us, weaken us.”

The alien shook his head, and his shoulders rose and fell with a great heaving sigh. “It was only then that I saw the folly of abandoning the old ways. I began to suspect that our government was using the Mouth Forest as a weapon against us. And when the Mouth Forest unveiled a humanoid race with tubules, a race based upon us but with the same neurotubes that its other thralls possessed, too few of us looked upon them with alarm, saw them for what they were. But most of my people were rapturous that ‘we’ would finally have a deeper connection with our world, for they believed that we would receive neuro tubules as well. But I knew better – the government was growing a race they could control: The Na-Ru Dii. Smaller and easier to control, yet vicious and cunning. They fought with dishonor. Once it had enough biomass and we had cut our manufacturing, the Mouth Forest began to push for aggressive euthanasia. It started with the old, the deformed, the ‘drags’ upon the planet’s ecology. The people cheered this. Then it culled the gluttonous, the inactive, then the fit and the active, and finally…the children. All…all of them. And the people, forgetting our most sacred laws, cheered for all of this. There would be people to cheer our extinction, even, if any were left to cheer. By the time a rebellion began, the whole planet itself was a weapon in the hands of our enemies. Even the trees were against us. We did not stand a chance against…well, you know the beasts on the surface above.”

“Tick Tick,” Tick Tick said dismissively. Of course the Great Mouths’ forms had been no match for the star spanning ravenous hunger of Roza.

“The beasts didn’t hold up too well when we went full Ultraviolence, Empok…” Burner Turner shouted at the hologram as the Lictas cheered.

“We tried to seize the Capital, but most of the army remained loyal to the government, and they had the Mouth Forest as well, and the Na-Ru Dii. With such a force arrayed against us, the Rebellion was broken and scattered, split into factions who blamed each other for our defeat. I was the only one of the Archons who sided with the Rebellion, and when it all fell apart, the rebels looked to me to come up with a plan. I did, gods forgive me.

“Our race has always had men of great personal power, with the ability to turn thought into weapon. In the past, these men were known as wizards or mentalists or sorcerers, and they were feared. I am one of them, a secret I kept hidden most of my life. But we have been on the cusp of an evolution for centuries, for we are evolving away from beings of flesh to beings of psionic power, able to manifest energy from our minds. This evolution was the dream of our ancestors – to be able to summon the storm by thought, or move objects by will. But it was also the reason for our Exodus. The government feared this emergent power as it had feared the wizards, and suppressed those of us who had it – we were not a part of the artful balance of the world, after all. When the war began I gathered together as many of us as I could, and we fought for the evolution. Against our own government, against the Mouth Forest, and against crazed fanatics devoted to self-destruction. We held them at bay, and killed a hundred of them for every one of us, but we knew we would lose in the end. Their numbers were too great. So we pooled together our power for one psychic mission, to enter the mind of the Mouth Forest. Some of us wanted to destroy the Mouth Forest, and perhaps we could have, but I and others believed we could free it, explain to it how it was being misused. I was the Archon; the others followed me. Eventually, we agreed to try to reach out to the Mouth Forest with our telepathy. I chose to believe that words could solve this…”

He shook his head slowly, his eyes regretful. “…I was convinced that the Mouth Forest was just misguided, in error due to manipulation by our leaders, and that all we needed to do was let it know that it was hurting us, let it understand what it was truly doing. And that it was we tried to do. When we explained that it was a pawn of the government, the Mouth Forest listened. It agreed to hear us. It asked to meet face to face. I led a delegation, to meet the Mouth Forest at her nearest node tree.

“We were ambushed even as we left our Necropolis, and a massive attack nearly took the city. It was only at great personal cost and the heroic sacrifice of seven psions that we were able to retreat, and drive back the assault. We contacted the Mouth Forest again, asking why it had betrayed us, and it laughed at us. It said we were naive children. It said that it was in charge of our government, not its pawn. Our leaders were either bribed, blackmailed, or brainwashed into its service. Then it..it showed us its plans, its dreams, the horrible things it wanted. We fled from the images in terror. Two of my friends killed themselves that night, and the Mouth Forest immediately took steps to shield itself from a third mental invasion. Our opportunity passed. The Mouth Forest made clear she was a malevolent entity, and she has been attacking us at our necropolis ever since. We are going to lose – and die – because I ignored the warning signs about the Mouth Forest. I should have killed it when I had the chance, as the Winter Archons would have done. But I wanted to believe in fairy tales, and I wanted to clasp at a utopia that was false.”

Empok Nor cleared his throat. “I want it known that the fault is mine, and mine alone. My soldiers, my fellow psions, and my friends…they all have been exemplary in their courage and passion. It is not their fault, I want that known, I want that to echo through the tomb-halls of history. We shall be forgotten, but we may be avenged. There is an ancient prophecy, a prophecy that a swarm will come from the stars, and shall humble the Mouth Forest and destroy it. My friend Callane wrote it down in the hours after our audience with the Mouth Forest, right before she walked into a dissembler beam. The swarm shall be female, like the Mouth Forest, but it shall have a male drone who acts as its minder. A man like us, and he shall be the one of prophecy to redeem us. That man is you, Prophesied Hero. We…we need redemption. My people refused to believe what was happening. I refused to believe it, and we abandoned the old ways for softness and cruelty. Even now, there are those still fighting for the Mouth Forest outside our necropolis. They have embraced the genocide of their own species, the abandonment of our proud history and traditions. But they shall die, and perhaps they shall realize what they have done at the end. The Mouth Forest shall remain, and its Na-Ru Dii slaves, and that it is all. If I did not loathe them so, I would pity them, for their mother seeks to create a blasphemy beyond reckoning – a world of never-ending, never changing cycles. No world with life upon it should ever be balanced – they must be ever shifting, ever changing, not a circle but a spiral, winding on a course of time as lines are born and lines die. The Mouth Forest shall make the world a circle to be its central spoke, the loathsome hub around which all life must orbit.”

Empok Nor rested his large, calloused hand against the invisible window. “I have only two hopes, after I am gone: I hope for the Mouth Forest’s defeat. It feeds on misery. It wants a stagnant, balanced world so there is no potential for it to lose power, and no potential for anything to live, except in misery. I can only hope that in the future, in the prophecy, the Mouth Forest is forced to feed on itself. Feed on your own misery, you bitch, when a larger, greater nightmare finds you. I hope you know the horror of defeat. But second is that the prophecy comes true. Our spark, our sacred essence cannot be allowed to fade. The most important part of us is our cultural Memory. The great accounts, our deeds of heroism. We have gathered it here in stone, but also, in the wisdom and psionic power of the ancient wizards. The Ancients foretold the Hive Mind’s coming, though I did not heed the signs. And with her, shall come a rebirth. Not of us directly, no; we are doomed. But our language, our memory, our heritage…these shall be preserved by new stewards, who will take our knowledge forward.”

“You, Prophesied Hero, must go to the maelstrom of our power with the Hive Mind. You must harvest our energy, and…and then…and then…and then…”

The picture faded, and the voice skipped.

“…and then…and then…and then…”

“It’th corrupted,” Deeta said, leaning it and peering at the hologram with an earnest look.

“Of course it is. He was about to tell me what the hell I was doing, here,” I said. I watched as the last vestiges of the image and repetition of phrase faded away into solemn silence. The plasma shields were gone, and their hum was, also.

“The path to the psionics area is opened,” I said. “But what are we supposed to do? Do you know, Roza?”

Deeta was silent for a moment. “What do you think of them?” She asked, quietly.

“Of who, the Old Ones?”.

“Yeah.”

I shrugged. “They are dead, and they left behind a big ball of energy that they – and you – want me to do something with. What?”

“But do you think they were…good?”

“How do you mean good?’” I asked. “Like moral, or good at surviving, what?”

“That’s just it; I don’t know what it means. Eugene, you can tell if a race of people are good or evil, I can’t; they all just look like food to me.”

“Why does it matter? They are gone…”

“It matters, Eugene. It matters a lot. You did it with the Naruti…” Roza said, almost a plea. “Are they good? Can we use them?”

“I saw myself in the Naruti girl. I think they are like my own people,” I said. “Stranded with maniacs ruling over them. They carry on as best they can. The Old Ones…I think it’s as he said. They forgot themselves, and remembered who they were too late.”

“And so they are…?”

“Good, I suppose,” I said. “I mean maybe they have a closet full of severed cats’ heads somewhere, but he seems reasonable based on the small recording.”

Tick Tick applauded uselessly with a grin. “Tick Tick!”

“Then…they will serve,” Burner Turner said, elated. “We shall use them.”

I frowned. “They are quite dead, Burna.”

Burner Turner looked to Tick Tick, who nodded eagerly, and Burner Turner drew in a deep breath. “We shall now explain why you are here.”

I leaned in. “Please, please do!”

“The Swarm has a substantial catalog of instincts and ready-available firmware, but none of it is suited for creating a race of individuals. All of it relies upon our consciousness. Our HiveMind. We do not have an individual firmware that is distinct from us. The Old Ones’ ball of energy contains those instincts, as well as knowledge, language, religion, culture. There is…one other consideration: knowledge of the Firm. The Firm is the most dangerous force in this universe and several others, and while dwelling upon their existence for too long is unwise, to blunder into space and not be wary of them is suicidal.”

“I don’t disagree with that,” I said, confused. “But I don’t understand what resurrecting this alien race is for.”

“Not resurrecting, but using their memories, instincts, and culture as a template,” Burner Turner said. She smiled, and put one of her giant hands on my cheek. “Because a married couple must have children.”

It took me a second to understand her meaning, or rather, to grasp at it. “Children?” I looked at all their faces, seeing the same hungry, eager, happy look. “Roza’s and mine?” I asked aloud.

Tick Tick grinned. “Tick Tiick!” She said, throwing open her arms and mimicking the word ‘Surprise!’ as best she could.

I looked at Deeta, who stared at me with goo-goo eyed adoration. “This – all of this – is about wanting to make a baby?”

The girls – all of them – clasped their hands and let out a swooning sigh in unison. Baby was the magic word, a nascent desire buried into Roza, part of her primordial female nature gifted to her by the Terrifying Mass that had set her on a quest for a husband. Deeta jumped up and down, making her nerdy tits jiggle as she clapped uselessly. “Babieth! Babieth!” She said, excitedly. “How Romantic! We’re gonna be a Mommy!”

“I ah…” I blinked. “Why do we need the extinct psionic alien race to make children, exactly?”

“I am a HiveMind. I don’t wish to make just one single baby,” Deeta said, with no lisp. “I want to make a mighty race with you. The psionic energies of the Old Ones are perfect for our baby boys. They shall be infused with power, and the grim resolution of a dying race. You have confirmed the energy is good…” she pinched my cheek. “And you did it without knowing why I was asking.”

“Okay, but how do the Naruti factor into this?” I asked. “And the Great Mouths?”

“Our sons shall need mates,” Deeta said. “The Naruti shall serve.”

“You plan to only make boys?’ I asked.

“I shall birth boys with your seed and my eggs. But to avoid any untoward implications of incest, our boys shall have counterparts with the Naruti, who have exterminated their males and rely upon flowers now.”

By their countenances and their clenched teeth, I could tell the Lictas did not much like this idea. But Burner Turner raised her hands.

“Hold, my sister-selves,” she said. “You and I may not like the Naruti. We may believe the Naruti are a race of raging bitches, but Eugene has judged the skittish and cowardly ones as adequate semen ditches for our darling little boys, so we shall be civil with them…”

“Can’t we just buy some Dark Elves?” Sowya asked.

“Oh no!” Roza cried, alarmed. “They are BAD girls! They’ll put out cigarette butts on our boys’ pe-“

“We all accept the Naruti,” Burner Turner said, cutting Roza off. “We are not heretics.”

“I am glad to hear that,” I said, eying the deadly assassins nervously. They looked displeased, still. Best to change the subject. “So, um…babies!” I said.

The thought made them swoon, and won them back over, and talk of itty bitty boots and psionic blasts of energy had them gushing with excitement.

“What does it mean for the Great Mouths, Arena Mother?” Ranora asked.

“The Great Mouths shall be a test for our children,” Deeta answered. “They shall make war upon it and defeat it, and carry off their wives as the Romans did to the Sabine. The war shall be under the watchful eye and instruction of the Swarm, of me, in the same way that a mother lioness teaches her cubs to hunt. They shall wrestle away the Naruti as their mates, both as liberators and conquerors.”

“Okay…” I said. “But how do I, um, manage this? Do I drink lots of tomato juice?”

“It will be no more exerting than our normal lovemaking,” Roza replied. I made a mental note to get tomato juice.

Roza continued: “A human male produces 100 million sperm when he ejaculates. Through diet and exercise, we have boosted your sperm count to 500 million. All sperm you produce are highly motile; I used gene therapy to correct several deficiencies in human male sex organs to boost your numbers. Remember when I said I could make your balls tingle more?”

I nodded. “Right, right…” I said. “So…we shall have five hundred million sons?

“Well, to start it shall be about one million. There are only about that many Naruti of any use to us, after all. Once they have slain the Great Mouths, we shall use the bio matter of her Mouthlings, trees, and wayward Naruti to create more, pure Naruti using axlotl. We should be able to convert enough for the rest of our sons.”

“You mean 500 million of our sons and 500 million Naruti!?” I asked. “That’s a billion people total.”

“We have gathered sufficient resources to support them, and we can provide them with the materials to make colony ships,” Deeta said. “They can then take their new wives to one of several candidate planets, which can support the capital of a star empire. I predict our sons shall be able to colonize or conquer about fifteen planets within the next decade, with a total population of 2.5 billion. By the end of the century they shall be an emerging power in this galaxy. At the end of the millennia, they may even begin to start staffing jobs at the Firm.”

“And we shall finally have advocates there,” Burner Turner, the ancient voice of the Swarm, said with a smile. “No longer shall we live in fear of a single Hierarch unmaking us. There are protections for family of workers at the Firm. We shall not go the way of the Queefers.”

“I hope this wasn’t entirely born out of selfishness, Roza,” I said.

“All parenthood is vanity to some extent, is it not? But rest assured, my Love, that it is merely a pleasant perk of my deepest wish. You are my mate, and that must be meaningful. You and I must procreate, and make something which is of us both. Equally you, and me. But when a race mates with a man, a race is the result. If a single entity were born, such an entity would be of massive psionic potential. Totally unpredictable, extremely dangerous. An empire in one flesh. This is the safest way.”

The full magnitude of what we were creating began to register with me. Roza was going to create an empire overnight, and they would all be my sons. My children. I shifted a bit. Fatherhood was a lot to spring upon me, but I understood now why she waited until I was under the earth and nearly cutoff by Mouthlings.

“Well played, sweetie,” I said dryly. “Although I must say, I wish we would have discussed this, first.”

Roza looked stricken, which being in Deeta’s form, magnified the effect. “W-we did discuss it,” she said.. “we were eating breakfast, and I said maybe we should start trying to have children…”

I remembered this breakfast, now that she mentioned it. We had been sunning ourselves on the lanai on the ruins of Old Orion. A slug-a-hug had poured me orange juice, then went back to salving my exhausted cock. I was not as focused as I might have otherwise been. “And I said had we ever not been trying…” I added aloud.

“And then we both laughed and laughed,” Roza said with a big smile, revealing Deeta’s buck teeth. “But then I said I wanted to make progeny, and you said that we could try, and then we kissed and hugged and had a good cuddle…”

“I did say that. But I didn’t realize that meant going to Sporn and creating a galaxy-spanning warrior empire,” I said. “I-I thought Garozella would tell me when she was ovulating, and we’d have sex.”

“Well, it’s…it’s not a problem, is it?” Roza asked, looking worried.

“N-no…” I replied, folding my arms. “But I wish you hadn’t knocked out my memory.”

“I wanted you to assess the Naruti and the Old Ones honestly. Our children need to be happy, not miserable. I don’t want to create another nihilistic empire overcome with ennui. They are the most annoying neighbors.”

“Fair enough. So…uh…how?” I asked.

“There is a chamber about the psionic storm, beyond the Line which I cannot cross,” Roza said, tremoring a the last word. “One form must make the journey to the chamber, and there we must have sex. When your seed is in my womb, the psionic energy shall enter into it, and be imbued in your seed.”

I looked at Burner Turner, and at her wide hips and shapely ass. “Very well,” I said. “Burna, we’ll just get you, um, topped off, and then we can go back…”

Burna’s grin was wide, and she even grabbed at her crouch and leaned inward, obviously trying to hide her squirt.

“Burna?! What’s wrong with Deeta?” Roza asked.

“Oh! Nothing…” I said, looking at the cute Litheling. “She’s cute as a button. But you can’t cross the Line, you just said-“

“A Litheling can. She has a personality which can project me into the forbidden area – not a copy of me, a disconnected piece. Deeta is my choice,” Roza said, through Deeta. “She shall carry your seed. Burna is not a member of the HiveMind yet, and I cannot subsume her and make the journey. I shall not be cuckolded.”

“But won’t Deeta disconnect from the HiveMind?” I asked.

“For a time, but a neurotube has been lowered into the chamber. When Deeta is about to fuck you, she and I shall re-link, and it shall be me. Deeta is not a copy of me; she is me. When the line is severed, my consciousness shall enter an…unusual state. It is deeply concerning to consider, but it must be this way.”

“Well…as long as you won’t get hurt…”

Roza did something I did not expect: she looked worried.

“Roza, don’t risk-“

“I would use Garozella, but the disruption caused by the psionic storm makes that impossible. You can guess, now, why I sent the Lithelings to recover you when you landed and fell victim to the Tick-Ticks. The warriors I sent were all the ones I deemed most capable of surviving the disconnect. Aneka was…a disappointment. Of the rest, it became apparent by your…performance…that Manta, Citrona, and Deeta were the best candidates, so I tested each of them with you. Manta is too tied to me; her aspirations to merge and return to the Hive Mind make her unable to survive a separation. Citrona is strong, and an excellent form. She would make the jump, but not understand it, until it was too late. She would drown. But Deeta…Deeta understands it all. There is more Spiker Spider in her than any of the others. And in truth, her feeling for you most matches my own. She wants to carry your sperm, and even will die to do it. And so, she shall have her chance to do both.”

“Die?!” I cried. “No, I don’t want her to die.”

“Neither do I,” Roza said, in Deeta’s body. Her face was grave. “I want her to survive. I will be honest…I dread what’s coming.”

“Does she know?” I asked.

“She will, when I am done speaking to you,” she said.

I put a hand to Deeta’s chin, and a buck-toothed smile was my reward. “You are so brave…”

Deeta smirked. “Horny,” she said. “This form wants to bed you so bad…you are going to be locked in the chamber with her. She’ll be half savage with desire, and when I reconnect and am whole, I shall rape you until the psionic storm is gone.”

I grew stiff at the thought of being Deeta’s love slave, and the eyes of everyone present went to my crotch.

“Um…”

I saw the change in Deeta’s face, that meant the fullness of Roza was leaving. She grinned. “I’m going to fuck you thilly, *Thnookumth*” her smile remained on her face, but I saw fear in her eyes. “I-if I thurvive, that ith.”

“And now, the final leg of the journey,” Burner Turner said clearing her throat. “We must travel down the opened pass, until we reach the Great Line, the point at which we are so close to the psionic storm that Roza’s forms cannot go. The Litheling Deeta shall do what no Litheling has ever done; cross the line.”

Deeta smiled bravely, but she was trembling. “I will go,” she said. But I was worried.

The party moved out through the open door and into a tunnel that looked very much like the ones we had walked down, only it was bone dry. My Vulcannon was hefted along by Burner Turner, who carried it like a fanny pack, and I walked unencumbered next to Deeta. Her skin had paled, and she was sweating profusely. Tick Tick had departed me, and was hugging the nerdy Litheling with all her might, as if she might lose her if she let go. Even the Lictas, detached as they were from the rest of Roza, walked on with a grim unease. Everyone knew that we were walking to a moment of the greatest gravity.

There were no Mouthlings in these tunnels, although Burner Turner expected them to find the chamber and make their way down from behind. To that end, she stayed at the rear and frequently looked backwards.

“It is a shame that the first stall short-circuited,” Burner Turner said. “Had he still been with us, the door could be plasma sealed again until our return. As it is, we have to always watch behind us for Mouthlings.”

“Would they know to look here?” I asked.

“I hope not,” Burner Turner said. “But we cannot trust completely in luck; we must have contingencies for if they appear.”

Tick Tick made her way across Deeta, up Burner Turner’s tail and onto her shoulder, and with a leap she landed onto my head like a pigeon would land on a statue.

“What happens if Deeta dies, Tick Tick?” I whispered to the centipede, when she came back to me for an emergency Eskimo kiss.

Tick Tick throw her head in her hands. This time, Tick Tick was not flippant. She cowered, trembling, and hugged me. It was like asking what happens if a part of your body was about to be scooped out. I did not press the matter, and we walked on in silence for a ways, in the dim tunnels.

“You don’t have to do this, Deeta,” I whispered. “We could go back for one of the Elder Forms…”

Deeta looked stricken. “Ith thomething wrong with me?” She asked.

“No!” I exclaimed, seizing her. “Don’t misinterpret me. I love you in this form, Roza. It’s just I don’t like seeing you like this.”

“I’ll try to hide it better.”

“Deeta!”

“Bethideth,” Deeta said. “The Mouthlingth have infethted the tunnelth. It hath to be me. It hath to be. It hath to be…”

“Maybe this is too risky.”

“I am a dithpothable form…”

“Don’t you fucking say that, or I won’t walk another step,” I said.

“Don’t be obthtinate. For mortherth, childbirth ith painful,” Deeta said. “Thith ith the pain I mutht eckthperienthe to procreate. I am willing to do it. I could jutht take the eathy way out, and be cuckolded, but I won’t. I will not allow it.”

“Deeta…” I said.

Deeta shrugged. “I think I gotta get hurt, thnookumth. Thith ith why Lithelingth were created. It’th what we’re for. What I’m for. It…it all cometh down to m-me…”

“I don’t want you-“

“But I do, Eugene, I do. I want to have children. I want thith. Pleathe…pleathe don’t thay I can’t do thith. I need you to believe in me.”

We traveled onward in silence, down the blackened arteries until we reached a room-sized cavern. In the center of it was a fissure, a line which bisected the artery and continued on beneath the tunnel walls. It was about half my height in depth. The chasm was certainly not very deep, but the way that Deeta and Tick Tick froze when they saw it, with a kind of animalistic fear, made me treat the divide with respect.

“Is that it?” I asked.

Deeta, numb with fear, nodded. Tick Tick stared at it with bulging eyes.

The line in the cavern was like the joining of two tectonic plates together, a fault line that was a full stride apart.

“No point standing around,” Burner Turner said. “Let’s cross over.” Her face, and the faces of all the Lictas were grim, all knew this moment was serious.

It was a little hop to cross over to the other side, and the Burrowers followed after me. Such a little thing. Deeta was trembling like a lone leaf in a fierce early winter storm, her chest rising and falling. Tick Tick looked on with concern. I stood across the little divot in the ground.

Deeta looked at the line on the ground, and swallowed. She clearly didn’t want to be hurt either. She looked at the line with big eyes, venturing a foot towards it as if the chasm were a thousand thousand feet deep.

The Lictas all crossed over as simply as anything, and I did also. But Deeta and Tick Tick were stuck to the edge.

“Thith ith it,” Deeta said. She was shaking, her eyes welling. “I’m…I’m a little thcared.”

“I don’t like this,” I said. “This isn’t right…”

“It is right, Eugene. Stop saying otherwise; it only makes it worse,” Burner Turner whispered.

“This thing must take its course,” Ranora added, putting her arms around mine for a partial embrace. “She must do this alone.”

“Remember who you are, Deeta,” Burner Turner said, loudly. “Remember who you are, Deeta. Do not prevaricate. Steel yourself, and jump.”

“It’s harder for her,” I said.

“Believe me, we know,” Burner Turner said.

I took a deep breath. I needed to stop being a pessimist. Roza was committed to this. She needed me. I took a deep breath.

“You aren’t alone in this,” I said. “I’ll be on the other side, when you jump.”

That seemed to calm her a bit. Deeta took a deep breath. “C-catch me, Eugene, pleathe…”

I readied, my heart in my throat, for Deeta to jump. It was such a small distance, but the crack now seemed like an impossible chasm, a gash that was between life and death.

“Well…ready or not, here I come!” Deeta called out. As she leapt, she grimaced as if about to be stabbed.

Mid-leap Tick Tick cried out, a piercing scream which made my blood run cold. The tiny form buried her face into her hands. When Deeta landed on the other side and in my arms, her face was blank, and I saw the same countenance as a person stabbed through the gut; the same vacant, numb expression, the same notion that something was wrong, the otherworldliness of an impossible sensation.

This moment did not last long, for I watched as her pretty, sweet face twisted. Her eyes widened, her lips contorted and her pretty bucktoothed mouth opened in horror.

“I…I’m alone…” she stammered. Her body quaked as if having a seizure. Her eyes bulged. “I’M ALONE! I’M IN DARKNESS…”

“Deeta?!” I called out. My hand went to my chest, and checked at my heart, for it felt as if something sharp and plunged into it

Deeta clutched at the sides of her face, covering her ears. “It’s deafening, the silence! Oh no! I’m gone, I’m stuck, I’m trapped! I’m suffocating, I’m drowning! I’m broken, I’m alone! I’m alone! I’m alone! I’m alone…”

She was hysterical, screaming and repeating it over and over, writhing in my arms like a bug without its legs. I seized her tightly to my chest as her screams overwhelmed us both.

“Deeta…Deeta!” I shouted, so loud my voice hurt.

She did not answer, quaking in terror and the unfathomable horror of being separated from her own mind.

“She will die soon,” Burna said, grimly. “As did the others.”

“No she won’t!” I exclaimed. I seized her, shaking her until she stopped crying. She stared at me with wide eyes. I would have only one chance to save her, I knew. Only one word could do it.

“Roza!” I exclaimed.

The word – her name, her real name – reached her. She blinked at me, her mouth a little open, waiting for me to pour some kind of meaning into the vast emptiness of her existence.

“You are not alone,” I said, putting my hands to the sides of her face. “I am with you. I am Eugene, your husband. You are not alone; you are just in quiet.”

“It’s…it’s so dark…” she whimpered.

“We’ve been in the dark together before, you and I,” I whispered. “Do you remember, Roza, when you were a Spiker Spider, and I took care of you?”

Deeta shook her head slowly. “I can’t access-“

“I did. When you were a Spiker Spider, drowning in a puddle of gas, I rescued you. That’s when you fell in love with me. I took care of you, then. I will take care of you now. I am Eugene. I fought for you, and killed every single challenger in the Kumite who did not stand aside. I can protect you. I am here with you. I love you.”

These last words made her exhale with relief. “Oh…oh Eugene…” Deeta whispered, weakly. “H-hold my hand…”

I took it, and she clenched it tightly, tight enough that it hurt, but I was fine with that. I clenched back just as hard. Squeeze as hard as you want, my little nerdling, I thought to myself. She collapsed into my arms, and I picked her up as if she were a fainting princess.

“She has survived,” Burna said. With this, the other Lictas exhaled with relief. The Arena Mother smiled. “We can continue on to the psi storm.”

Tick Tick lifted her face. Her eyes were red, and streaming with tears, but as she saw me holding Deeta, she put on a brave smile. “T-Tick Tick…”

“I’ll take care of you,” I said to Tick Tick, planting a kiss on Deeta’s sweaty temple. Tick Tick rubbed her own temple, as if to try to simulate my lips. “I’ll get you to the psionic chamber. When you reconnect, Deeta will be ready.”

“Tick Tick,” Tick Tick said, panting, her eyes on Deeta with the gravest concern.

“Will you be alright, by yourself?” I asked. “There are a lot of Mouthlings…”

Tick Tick nodded. “Tick Tick,” she said. She blew me a kiss.

We walked onward, waving good bye to Tick Tick, who watched us as we departed down the chamber. Soon the dirt walls became clear, and we were on a great crystal walkway that ventured into a plane of darkness, an expanse of endless void, journeying onward and towards a distant beam of light.

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