I dig my claws in and brace myself, instinct warning me. With a short run she jumps and slams her wings down, but I hold on easily. We still move at a downward angle, parallel to the cliff wall. She beats her wings hard and repeatedly and even where I am I can feel the muscles on her chest working. The flight evens out and we gradually start to rise until suddenly something starts to lift us up. It is a noticeable jerk. The brood-tender stops flapping her wings and begins a spiral upwards. the sky starts to darken seriously now. There are only a few of the Swarm still outside. Sentries, lookout. We enter a large cave and reach an even larger space a bit later. Chamber. Suddenly the brood-tender twists and for a moment we are moving upside down.

With a jerk we stop, still upside down, but not falling. She folds her wings back and moves around a bit until I feel her muscles under me relax a bit. Sleep. It is time to rest, but I am not tired. I'm sure I will be soon, but for now I bite in the lump for some more blood and enjoy the pleasure the taste brings. I can feel it tingling through my body. I look around a moment. Through the opening to the chamber I can still see the outside. It looks much lighter than before but the light is cold and unpleasant. Other sun. Slowly, not much later, I fade again. Sleep.

Movement wakes me. For a moment I panic, before I recall some of the day before and my sense of self returns. I am. I am hanging on to a brood-tender hanging on to the roof of a cave. There are only imps here and the brood-tenders are by far the largest. Most of their size is due to their extraordinary limbs. I can see this now, my eyesight has improved since yesterday. I bite in the lump next to my mouth and some of the blood comes out. Unlike before it gives little pleasure. Instead I feel a pressure build, somewhere inside me. It is different from when I need to shit. I already shat yesterday, during the eating, but no-one seemed to care.

The movement is the tender shifting and getting ready to depart. The others hanging around and hanging on are also waking. There is a moment of anticipation and suddenly an imp near the entrance lets go, twisting in the air and opening its wings. Suddenly others launch. One, four, ten, suddenly the air is full of flapping wings heading for the exit. Near the back, one I know instinctively as a Queen looks on at the spectacle. The brood-tenders are also waiting. Once the air clears they also launch. With their larger wingspan they would have had trouble flying in the crowd earlier, so it makes sense.

A few frantic wingbeats later we glide out of the cave and into the morning sun. It is already quite hot and many of the Swarm are sunbathing along the rocky cliff. They scatter as the squat spawn exit their tunnels and start to move to the different caves or into the forest, as if they are the signal for work to commence. Spawn are much more compact than imps, if anything. Their rear limbs are stumpy, but powerful. The front limbs are longer and equally powerful, giving them an uneven gait. They live lower down but move through all the caverns to clear out debris. They have extra normal limbs instead of wings and use those to carry things.

The brood-tender lands at the bottom of the cliff and starts to pluck us off it's body again. This time I am ready for it. I let go in time and manage to land gracefully. Somewhat. At least I manage to scamper out of the way before the next is dropped on me. We are now where the food was, I can still smell the remains of it, but there is no food now. The important part is that there is no food now. I open my mouth and produce a soft 'screee' sound. I am not the only one. Somehow it is how we hatchlings should ask to be fed.

A low rumble answers us and we all know what it means. Quiet. Then the brood tender moves away. Some make to follow, but it deliberately throws up some dust at us with one of its rear claws without even looking. The message is clear. We are not to follow. I am still hungry and I eye the other hatchlings. They could be food. I am not the biggest, but not the smallest either. Some have already started to change a bit. Limbs lengthening or thickening, bumps on their back where wings will be or protrusions where another pair of arms will come.

I feel like my limbs are a bit longer than before. I want to be an imp. I know I will be an imp. When the brood-tender was preparing to fly, I knew already how it would feel. I want to feel it again. So hungry!

I am distracted for a moment, but nothing has happened yet. Others are looking too, sizing up the opposition. I am not the only one thinking of the others as possible food. Everyone feels the tension rise and we uncomfortably shuffle around a bit. One of the small ones snaps suddenly, as a bigger one gets a little too close. It bites and quickly scuttles away. The bigger one is stunned for a moment. I realize this is what is surprised. It recovers fast and rushes at the smaller hatchling. The smaller hatchling tries to hide behind others, but everyone is staying away from it.

Just before they collide I hear a *fwap* of spreading wings and there is a sound of air rushing. The two fighters collide and try to bite and claw one another, missing most of the time but scoring some bloody gashes. Something is coming through the air? Before I have time to look, there is a heavy thud of an adult landing. It grabs the two fighting hatchlings with its forelimbs, holding them by the neck and using two talons to put pressure on their jaws. The small one opens its mouth to let go of the bigger one's leg, while the bigger one releases a hip he had been biting into. The scamp seems to pause a moment, then it drops the bigger one. The big hatchling lands badly with its injured leg, but recovers fast. It brings the smaller hatchling to its mouth and casually bites the head off. I freeze. I remember how good brains were to eat and feel jealous for a moment.

It grunts twice after swallowing his mouthful. No in-fight. We are not to fight one another, though there is more to the meaning than that. It also means 'not now', that sometimes it is good? His inflection did not say when though. It is strange how much body posture and inflection can mean. I can finally take a good look at the scamp. It is very scarred and looks older, but its teeth are still healthy. It is very important to know about teeth. It is a bit in-between an imp and a spawn. Sturdier and shorter limbs than an imp, but not as compact as spawn, and relative equal length. The body is bigger and they can stand only on their hind limbs as well as move on all fours, but that looks weird. The wings are smaller than those of an imp. I wonder how it flies. The head is still much the same. Large eyes, large nose, large ears, quite a small mouth that opens wide with rows of pointy teeth.

It gives a quick rattling rumble in it's throat. I know what it means! Come, though the way it was said, it meant 'follow', so I do. At a bit of distance, as it is still holding the dead body of the small hatchling in one claw. It turns around and begins to move on all fours towards the forest edge. All threes, as one claw is full. It casually takes a bite. It is frustrating to see him eat while I am hungry. There is always a chance he drops bits. I wasn't the only to think so and there is a brief scuffle to determine who will move closest to the scamp. No claws or teeth, it's a friendly scuffle. The scamp looks back for a moment and we all freeze again. Something in its face. Amused. It finds us, amusing?

It stuffs what remains of the small imp in its mouth, rear limbs dangling outside of it and starts moving. It probably considers this a slow pace, but I almost have to run to keep up, as do the others! When we come to the edge of the vegetation it heads to a thick, black tree branch that is lying mostly on the ground. What is beyond is hidden from sight by leaves. For a moment I feel apprehensive. While I know it is a tree, I have not truly seen a tree before up-close. Something tells me the tree is wrong, but it can not tell me what.

With a rustle the scamp steps on the branch, or trunk, that is thicker than itself and disappears through the foliage. I do not wish to be left behind. Most of the others seem to feel similar and we move through. It is not as dense here, lower to the ground, we quickly pass through and I see what is beyond. Beyond is mostly nothing.

What I thought was a cliff wall reaching to even ground was in fact the cliff reaching to a small plateau. The branches and leaves come up right to its edge. From there is the true drop. The forest floor is far enough away that even my improved eyes can't make out any details. Creepers do cling to the cliff wall here, obscuring the view of the rock below. The branch we walk on widens enough to be called a trunk of its own before joining with the main trunk. The main trunk is simply massive!

The scamp easily climbs further up and we follow. Unlike the cliff caves, I feel the trees are home to creatures other than me, other than the Swarm, and I feel a bit exposed. Above me I can see light shining through a veil of red and black, giving everything below a gloomy red sheen. That is where we are heading, I am sure of it. Massive branches reach out from each trunk and seem to mix and intertwine up above.

It feels like we are travelling a well-worn path. The black wood is scored by claw marks. While we criss-cross between branches when they offer an easier way than straight up along the trunk. As we respectively walk and run, the scamp reaches out to a twig, snaps it off and starts to chew on it. Wait, did it swallow the hatchling at some point? Were there leftovers? I was too distracted to notice. When we reach the lower end of the canopy some hatchlings reach out to strip off a leaf. I copy them. It tastes good enough, but they are tough. It takes some chewing to turn one to mash, which is nice. It is good to chew something when hungry.

In the time we have been on the move I feel like I changed again. This time it is not that I am bigger with longer limbs, I just feel like I am more and things are less. More energy, it is easier to breathe and it takes less to pull myself up when we need to climb. I also feel like the tension from this morning is less, but now I feel more hunger. I can't decide which is worse.

While we traverse the red maze the scamp's attitude changes. Much more alert and wary of the surroundings. We all sense the change and copy it. I don't know what I should be alert for, but I am alert! It's hard to see much in this place. A deep breath through my nose tells me more. The path is mostly covered with the scent of the swarm, but there are hints of other creatures. We are moving slower now, so I have more time to look around, but the leaves around us are so dense now there is little to see.

Then I smell it. Food, up ahead. Secti or bugs, as my memory calls them, but slightly different. The second realization comes later. I can smell up ahead! There is a breeze to carry the scent. Interesting how you don't notice when the wind is not there, until it is again. It is not much further where we stop, the scamp in the middle of a rather wide space. It would be big enough to have all the hatchlings i have seen so far, easily and there were... many hatchlings.

The branches and leaves are so thickly interwoven here, I can step off the main branch and it just feels like I'm stepping on moss. On closer inspection, I am indeed stepping in moss. It looks like leaves, twigs and.... stuff, have come to rest here and have started rotting, creating a second ground above the ground. The whole space is like that. I move to the far end where I see an exit leading to an upwards slope. The breeze can be felt coming through and there are more scents on it, some I don't recognize. Plants, water. I wonder for a moment why plants smell so different from trees.

An irritated grunt draws my attention back to the scamp. I hadn't been the only one to go off on my own and it wants everyone's attention. It moves to the wall of this strange cave and with exaggerated movements scrapes some of the mix of rotting vegetation and dirt off the wall. Something stringy is holding things together, but it continues working. Suddenly some white shapes and a few brown ones are visible. Roots, larva. It uses both claws to take them out and hold them and shows them to me and the others. I wait expectantly for it to give them to us.

To my great disappointment it begins to eat them. I wait. It eats and waits, looking at us all in turn. A smaller hatchling that looks like it will be a scamp acts quicker than any of us and begins to dig at the wall. I look around for my own place to start digging. Due to my place near the other exit hole, I find it hard to find a wall where no-one growls at me. I still remember 'no' 'fight'. My own ingenuity brings the answer.

I move to a wall, ignoring the snarling hatchling, and begin to climb. Once I find a nice place on the roof of this strange cave, I begin digging. I can use only one claw, but most of the others do so too anyway. One who was digging too fast ends up shredding its food, ruining much of it, after that the scratching slows down.

The only real problem of where I am is the dirt falling down on me and the occasional secti that escapes me, but I think I have a better harvest than the others anyway. What makes me nervous is the scamp. He has been paying me more attention than the others while we are here. I do not want him to pay too much attention to me. I am very certain my head is also delicious, but I need it where it is.