—O Rancor? Line? (No response.) Where’d you scuttle off to?
Noon sun floated high, but clouds and mist left the grasslands awash in gray. In faint wind, the land roiled like an lake with sharp green waves. The stalks didn’t reach her katathorax — dangerous place for the hive to operate, but such was the only territory left to claim.
By rule, all who left the tunnels by day wore concealing cloaks — and only the upright castes even got that honor. That Trist was granted such a privilege stung like the slightest of insults.
The grand waves of this choppy green lake crested high — and not from wind. The horizon undulated with slow hills. Trist marched across, raptorial scythes cutting down the stalks that impeded her.
Each step was a exercise in deliberate balance; she was will-bound to always walk upright in the grasslands by light. All others legs must remain folded up against her katathorax and hidden in her cloak. Likewise her other arms folded up against her anathorax.
She unleashed another scything strike, but it gave her pause. Was this against the will? No mortal had raptorial arms, after all — but the danger they needed insurance against was being spotted from far away, by travelers or scouts. Underneath the cloak, nothing disguised Trist’s segmented body. (As it should be) Trist thought.
And from a distance, would the sweep of her bladed limb not seem like a man wielding a mortal tool? But that logic didn’t convince her. It wasn’t a sure conclusion, and the Queen’s will was to take caution in these matters.
(Curious that I was not already will-bound to sheath them, though,) Trist thought. (I’d know if there was rule against it.) Few workers had raptorials, and few risked traveling the grasslands by light, and few were so exhausted by these limits as to strain against them.
Trist must be the first; she’d set the precedent.
Her palps briefly tap her satisfaction — then they droop. She could give herself the leeway, in some vacuous logical sense. But she knew the will. Their Queen was cautious, so Her worker knew the right answer without asking.
Raptorials folded up and away, and thee cloak shifted as she snaked out her secondary pair of arms.
—Assertion, (she strummed her line back to the hive, flagging an idle gyne of the angel caste.)
The will would be amended with this corollary.
And the next time a soldier bristles at not being able to cut their way through the weeds, they’d be right to curse Trist’s name.
While her mind was on her lice, she sung out into the surface’s misty void once more.
—Rancor? Line? Rancor?
—The fuck you want, Trist?
Rancor struck a response with such force that Trist, listening intently for any faint vibration, flinched. Her lice jittered in distress, and a hand went up to her scalp, massaging the holes in her skull.
The other chrylurk was much closer than she’d expected, but strummed as loud as she could. Not even a warning. (Bitch,) Trist thought.
So Trist grabbed the ephemeral serivane line crossing all the meters between them — Rancor stood lower (obscured? no wonder Trist didn’t see her) — and tugged. If asked to explain her behavior, Trist was just orienting herself, pulling in the direction of her sister. Forceful? Yes, but she was just so excited to see her, to know she was okay.
—Where were you! (Trist replied.)
She was loud, too. Not as loud (she wasn’t a bitch), but she made sure inflict a similar sense of someone shouting inside your skull.
—Ask my damn lice. I’m hunter. I was hunting. What do you want?
—An excuse (Trist said, palps tappy.) You know the court won’t even let a drone outside for air unless you give a reason. Oh, caution~
—Duh. I know, so why are you telling me?
Now that Trist had a binding to Rancor, she could walk a straight line there. She might have ran, but then Rancor would feel her running.
—Read between the lines, bitch. Someone keeps untethering herself, so I get to stretch my legs making sure you didn’t get caught in a transmutation circle.
—Idiot. Dropping lines is caution. Means I won’t get made, and if I do, then I’m saving you girls from going down with me—
—Meaning it’s that much harder to rescue you!
——which becomes pointless if I get some prancy little knight running after me, leading right back to the hive. And why? Because you can’t go a second without the Queen’s voice in your ear telling you how you’re such smart and special worker?
—Maybe you should ask my lice. You don’t know the first thing about me.
Finally, Trist crested the hill. It dropped down suddenly, and there lay her sister. Her cloak lay brazenly open, exposing her sculpted anathorax and glistening chrysoma. The camouflaged bug crouched by the bank of a creek trickling through the valley, and her claws were full.
Rancor had several bloody arms fully of thick, limp coils, a dead snake with red and purple scales. Her moutparts everted, and maxillary scapels dissected the meat of the head while the proboscis licked at the sanguine juices.
—What’s that?
A hand fisted the prey by the neck, flipping it so that its top side was visible. The eyescales above the mouth were cloudy with blood, but then drifting eyes caught what was wrong. It had five extra eyes, all running along its spine, and each still glowed!
—Chimera (Rancor answered, malice withdrawn from her tone.) Ain’t it a catch? It’s why I was unbound, you know. Lotta miasma and a fucking inmut on this one. Kept my serivane out? Couldn’t have gotten the drop on it.
Trist slid down the side of the hill, cloak dirtied in the cloud of dirt she threw up behind her. She approached the chrylurk standing upright, but this close to her sister, she wanted to put down her other legs, to sprawl out like a insect.
—What does it taste like? (Trist asked.)
—Get on your knees, say you’re sorry, and I’ll let you lick it.
Trist stood up straighter.
—I ate before I left (she sent.)
Rancor clicked her mandibles together. Hands let go of the snake while the proboscis extended, needle-trunk constricting the dead serpent. The long tentacle wrung, so many thin teeth slipping past scale to endow the whole throat of the creature with a necklacce of beading blood.
Then, with a sudden rip, she pulled her proboscis back, flesh splitting with the motion’s violence, and spray of blood suspended a dozen tiny droplets in the air. The faint scarlet gush fell upon her head and anathorax.
Her wet truck curled up flush against her fangs and mask, leaving a blood-drool that her palps languidly wiped at.
—Tastes like shit anyway (she said.) Magic’s magic but miasma ain’t got nothing on a good soul. I just like some blood on my tongue.
—Antiblight fermentation might be good for it (Trist noted.)
The soldier stood in front of the hunter now, and the new arrival was taller. Where Rancor was lithe and graceful, Trist had bulk.
—Not my problem. I’ll cart it back to the hive and let the wenches worry about how to cook it.
—You really don’t care, do you? No curiosity about the other castes, nothing but lice and bloodlust in head of yours.
—And regular lust (Rancor sent, palps tapping, fangs out.)
—You’re a worker. (Trist crossed her arms.)
—So? I saw how you were just looking at me, slut. (As she sent it, she leaned toward Trist, wet proboscis unfurling — without everting its needles. Her apertures were wide, eyeing the other bug like she’d spotted weakness.) Why don’t you ask your lice who the surrogates practice with~ Wouldn’t mind taking another worker. Maybe you’d loosen up if you got your core—
—Shut up (Trist sent, once more spiking her volume sharply.)
—You’d cut the line if you really didn’t want to hear it. Do you know who’s ovipositor is longest? Hint: it’s not Lady Arrogance.
—Fuck off, bitch (she sent, glaring down. Trist was taller than Rancor.)
—You’re telling me to fuck off? Oh, was I the one who tracked you down while you were doing actual work for the hive? Was I the one literally looking for an excuse to dick around? I forgot, my head’s too full of lust to keep these things straight.
Trist turned around and took a step toward the hill she’d just slid down.
—No (Rancor sent.) Don’t just stomp off as soon as you stop having fun. Of all the reasons you could have made up to go outside, why’d you pick fucking with me?
—We’re bound. Can’t you figure it out?
—Meh. I can tell you’re fucking confused and can’t be assed to sort out your feelings. I’m not doing your work for you. Figure yourself out then tell me.
Trist grew air into her spiracles, abdomen inflating, then let it whistle out.
—I was having fun (Trist sent, sending a searching look back at her sister.) Even with you grumping at me. It was cute.
—Oh, so I was right about how you were looking at me. Got yourself a crush on the scixe huntress?
Even as she responded, Trist kept walking away. Distance didn’t end conversations between chrylurks, though it ended something. Rancor remained by the creek.
—How old are you? Since parascixion?
—Six or seven years, why?
—I… I like that. It shows, I mean? In the way you act. Your confidence.
—Eh, more to it than that. Queen got better about breaking her thralls after me, grooming them to be nice and simpering like you.
—I’m not simpering. (Her labium pouted outward, unseen. By now she’d reached the base of the hill.)
—You’re slave to the web and will, though. She likes that, it gets her off. (Quickly, Rancor set down the snake.)
—It keeps the hive running smoothly!
—And it’s hot. There’s two parts to it, can’t deny that.
As she strummed that, Rancor was finally approaching with sift steps, reflexively adopting ambust-silence. Her primary arm — not raptorial — reached out to hold Trist high on her anathorax. The larger chrylurk jumped.
—Hey, Trist? I’m not apologizing, cuz you deserved all that and more for bothering me. But if what you really want is to sit for a bit away from all the drones and bondage, I’d be down for that. (Rancor’s antennae extended out, brushed the cheekplates of Trist’s head.) And just so you know. I meant what I said about letting you lick if you get down on your knees and—
Trist responded with a labium snapping out, teeth of her lower jaw nipping at the other chrylurk.
—Ugh! (Her palps were tappy, though.) You almost sounded nice for a second there.
—I don’t do nice, I just keep the accord.
—Yeah, I noticed. You’re older than our manners.
—Surprised a priss like you would fall for me. Our Queen doesn’t play favorites but. I’m not her favorite, you know?
—I’m quite familiar with the court’s aesthetics (Trist sent with sharp plucks.) All the scixe girls want to fall in hate with exscient thralls that treat them like vermin! It’s so… fucking… ugh. We’re better than them, you know? So why…
Rancor’s grip — she hadn’t let go — on Trist’s anathorax tightened. Her silken hair was cut short, and the curls grew messier when she shook her head.
—Idiot. You might as well ask why dogs sniff each other’s butts. Of course ’lurks wanna ram in stinger into exšh’t, egging them up is how the hive grows. ’swhat we’re evolved for.
—But you… (Trist stopped. Hesitated, then decided to throw herself into the confession.) I knew the rumors about you. I… thought about it — even though I knew it wasn’t appropriate for my caste. We’re workers! We aren’t will-bound for reproduction, it’s not our purpose.
—Don’t piss me off.
—Ugh, I’m trying to have a moment here! Fine, whatever. You aren’t like them, and that’s what I admire about you. I keep accord with the will but… it starts to feel too much like pretending to be human, sometimes. The point was to get away from all that.
“If you’re trying to flatter me,” Rancor growled, jaw unhinging, claws stirring into motion under her cloak. “It’s working.” Her other hands reached out, groping the other chrylurk, and eliciting a sharp breath when they descended to the chrysoma.
—So yes (Trist finally admitted.) You asked me if I knew who had the biggest ovipositor? I… want to know. Tell me what it’s like.
Rancor grinned, mandible parting to show her maw dripping with anticipation.
—Okay, slut. (Rancor pointed back at the edge of the creek.) C’mere, we’re going to do this with pictures. Length’s one thing, but our ever-alluring Queen made sure to give each of them their own shapes. I’ll make sure you know everything you need to pick the right one.
—Choose the…? Rancor! I never said I was going to—!
—Right, right. Just curious. And you got so curious you went out looking for me. (Her pharyx, that dark and wriggling organ, lapped up at her drool. Her breath smelled like raw meat.) Maybe I should stop talking then, and see what you resort to when you get more curious.
—Please.
Rancor was walking away from her — but the smaller chrylurk hadn’t let go, so Trist was dragged along. They scuttled off together.