‘The Pod knows. The situation is untenable, but I am able to maintain security. The Chamber remains secret. I will continue to inform you as the theme of this piece we have written changes. Collected data has been included in this message. Report concluded.’ Her tongue drooled. Her spurs flexed so fiercely that they were almost horizontal in their protrusions from her legs. Somewhere, a humanite was laughing. Somewhere, a drone peacefully drifted from their body, their voice sent to the sky as hairs upon their legs softened, slackened, and finally went still. Life proceeded, as it had bars before the Queen had accepted the woven mesh of fluid-coated silk. The smell, taste and feel of the thinker’s notes enveloping her senses, and muting under layer of bedmoss the rest of her world. Life proceeded. Skthveraachk dug naked claws into the rock until the keratin cracked.

‘The Pod knows.’ Tongue ran over the thread again, and again, and again. ‘The Pod knows.’ Graspers stretched the silken pattern into a mesh, turning and disorienting the arrangement. As if manipulating how her ever more frantic vibrations struck the message would alter its meaning. ‘The Pod knows.’ Worst-case scenarios. Fallbacks, countered plans, prospective futures. The wind had become a memory, the force of the scratching air through the chasms and canyons barely a trickled echo in the deluge of activity the camp around the still convoy now sung. “The Pod knows.” Unfortunate. Had the shrieking winds remained, Skthveraachk’s own screams could have been thrown to the Composer in the sky beyond pity. Now, she could only scream with closed vents and silent shakes.

“Queen is distressed. Aid required?”

“Did you taste of this information?” It had been passed through an observer. An aged scout that had been struck during the war of Her Mother’s Retribute, and crippled from abdomen down. Bile still clung to the network of threads from its journey; weaver, to the second stomach of the drone, marched with the resupplying haulers, to the Queen’s claws under the cover of rocks which curled up like burn strips of palmidia in a summer drought. Removed from throne. Band, deactivated. Hidden in a half-built bivouac of bodies that had every head turned to the outside, save the observer, who waved antennae in confusion.

“Commanded by the thinker. Transport only. Scent marks message. Fear. Resolve. Assurance. Did not inspect contents.” Suspicion. In the breath between the beats of her heart, a single broiling, slurried pitch blackness which gurgled against reason. There was only truth. There was only what was, and what had been, and what would be. The observer had answered. She had felt suspicion. What was wrong with her? “Menders murmur Queen has been neglecting visits. Potential injury?”

“Mender priority to physical battleground injuries. Support to wounded voice or wilting mind, luxury unaffordable for now. Task completed.” An emotional sense of the message was acceptable, even those around her now likely could not help but smell the droplets of marker preserved in the threads, wondering at the reasoning behind using such delicate means for simple communication. Three previous drones tasked with transport had confirmed their curiosity had led them to investigate the silksong. The observer’s eyes were still at peak functionality; Skthveraachk was glad he would not need be silenced like the other three. “Rejoin the chorus. Designate self available for new tasking.”

“Received. I sing protest to you as I sung to your mother. Queen is Queen. Menial is menial. If one drone is silenced so mender may treat Queen’s temperament instead, such would be accepted by all. Better that than an untreated Queen, who’s temperament sings the colony to a thousand silenced drones.” Impudent. Presumptuous. Not incorrect. Regardless of role, age had a way of bringing a drone to the mindset of a thinker. Dangerous, but. What was not dangerous in the new life they lived these measures? Observer departed. Queen, within the heap of inward gasters, was left with the new truth. The Pod knows. The Pod knows. The Pod knows. Six requests in the form of six separate legs rubbed and scratched at her core, waiting expectantly to be informed as to the cause of the distress. Skthveraachk listened to the silk sing one final time before tearing it to shreds, consuming the remnants in wadded ball.

“Queen is distressed?” Interrogative. The colony felt her tremors.

“Source of distress destroyed.” Truth. The silksong which revealed the reality back in the caldera nest was no more.

“What was the source?” Natural curiosity. Colony’s desire to protect against future trauma.

“Dangerous item.” Truth. Her fear only occurred upon the delivery of the physical report. It was the culprit. It was the cause.

“Queen must avoid this object in future.” Establishing of new truth and response, incorporating previous experience.

“Contact may be required. It will be tolerated. If encountered again, threat will be destroyed.”

“Received.” Truth. Truth. Truth. As they had before, more reports would come. They would sing to her. They would be dissolved. The colony would not know of it, would not be endangered by the truth of it, would not have it added to their memories. She had not sung a single untruth; when the bivouac broke around her, and the frigid Dracan air struck like a crash into the consuming seas, Skthveraachk ran straight to the nearest refuse pit to empty every one of her sacs. Spurting, spilling, until she collapsed under the weight of her emptiness, and the hundreds of alarmed calls the Queen set to assuring one by one. All was well. She was not frenzied. She had not lied. All was for the protection of the colony. Mantra which became mental echo, repeated ad infinitum, chanted with the fervor of the Founders themselves. It did not help.

“Send two menders to the third echelon barracks. Disregard. Send four attendants to the third echelon barracks. Disregard. Repeating last, but outer faderise embankment of fourth echelon barracks.” Skthveraachk soldier, or, Skthveraachk soldier; one of the two from the fourth echelon of the attack column was the last to possess her tap-pad. Safe-keeping, when she was needed to lead. Menders, scouts, many crafters and delvers had taken to the utility of the belts and rudimentary fabrics made of skin and salvage from the battlefield, but she knew with sharpest bite how the humanites detested it. The colony, her species’ problems were a symphony unto themselves without the Queen adding to them for her convenience.

Bivouac had dissolved around her, bodies flowing down and away to disperse across the soil. Fade had come bars ago, but the lights from the Sovereignty’s convoy discolored and made grey what should have been a starry sky. Stealing their glimmer for the humanite’s own purposes, forcing the Queen to crawl under that empty void. Skthveraachk had taken the message close enough to her empty throne and alien masters to avoid suspicion, but far enough that even a bot or wyvern would need fly over hundreds before reaching her. There was barely enough room in that roadway for the aliens themselves to encamp before resuming the march next rise; her own people coated the plains, the ridges, the mesas around them, tens of thousands at rest while hundreds more maintained a watchful perimeter. Attendants were enough. Not menders. Not another bivouac of her children. She retched at each call of concern, each assurance there was nothing amiss. The Queen did not want the link. She wanted space. She wanted air.

“Attendants present. Commence?”

“Yes. Focus to core. No scouring. Internals only.”

“Received.” It would have been better if she was stationary. For them, and her. They began despite her stubborn strides, her insistence on getting above, getting out of the multitude of shivering forms sharing their heat with one another. Mounting atop her, and striking with perfect force a drumming of their forelegs and antennae and sheathed scythes. Pulse after wave of vibration from their blows and voices rippling her muscles and meat within as they soothed and sung of home. The reserve of Emerald Droplets Which Fall in her mother’s, mother’s, mother’s time. When you could smell the phidite dew all the way in Hollowcore when the wind blew alto. As she arrived at height enough to gaze both forward at the cube tents and fabrics stretched across still vehicles, and back to the landscape painted black with lives instead of red, all Skthveraachk could smell now was the baleful tang of the biomass fed to their machines. The salt of alien bodies. The grease they expelled from every hole.

The Queen looked down, and watched for the square of false-light to ascend its way from the masses of her people. To be delivered into her graspers by the bleary soldier, roused to deliver, and just as quick to depart for what precious sleep could be garnered before the rise. Slimmest attendants delved their furled claws through her vents, tenthways to her lungs, and set to pulling free viscous buildup whilst she fumbled to activate the correct feature of the device. Knowing her success by the bleeping sound, blipping light, and rise of floating pebble orbs which took flight from the device. Showing an image of her body upon the screen through which the Queen viewed an image of her body viewing the screen.

“Ckhehnvraahll Queen, may your tasks be those which preserve a world.” Pause. Waiting for a reply which would not come, habit written into the very carapace of her song. Antennae clacked hesitantly, awkwardly, as she realized the break lengthened to beat. “I am sorry. You are correct. Were correct, in your last sending. That the notion of communicating a message entire, without participation from partner, is a most peculiar sensation. Not seeing your dance as we speak, not smelling of that kakstrip wine on your breath, not…” Her music faltered. Something clawed at her insides far deeper than the graspers of the attendants, their impacts on her shell easing physical tensions whilst mental ones slithered behind her eyes. Ckhehnvraahll would not be permitted to see. Skthveraachk tightened her grip on the hillside, the world tilted at an angle.

“I have had opportunities to contact you. I have chosen not to for many of them. It is not for lacking desire of your voice, of your presence, but a desire to keep you from this place. I have kept those once of Ckhehnvraahll-Colony removed from the fighting, as much as I can. Do not protest!” There was no protest. Clicking mandibles together, hearing as if through the future the dogged frustration her vassal would express, Skthveraachk raised her head to show just edges of the delicate underside of her skull. “Do not protest. They are Skthveraachk-Colony, they tend our new crops and attend my queens and fill my nest. They are not wasted. I cannot have their memories of you wasted, lost here in these red sands. I need your words. I need you, to tell me when. When it is enough. To, remind me of my reasons?” These were the wrong notes. This was the wrong direction for the piece to take. Attendants upon her and beneath her and inside her washed her orifices with palmidia and kept their soothing pace, but there was a need such massages could not touch. A selfish, foolish want.

“I am doing things here you would not approve of. I am making decisions I fear, and fear will have ramifications beyond that which is seen. But I do them for Skthveraachk-Colony. I do them for Slough Queen. I do them for the world the humanites call Kayyhaitch. Our world. I died for our world, would die again for our world, and death is the final note. The true end.” Stop. The music was dour, the hope becoming a dirge. What if the humanites were to watch this composition before it was sent on? The thinker said they listened through the bands, the throne was always transmitting, their armor was always tracked, so why not every piece of their technology? “I am willing to die for my victories, so is not anything else acceptable? If my death would aid, then would not my life, however filled with choices that go against all we know and all we value, be of even greater value? Peel the memories and to the sky with what is sung of Skthveraachk in that future! So long as there is a future, I will kill, and I will use humanite tools, and humanite emotions as weapons, and burn their old and melt their eggs and I will deceive and I will l-…” Revulsion. Horror. The drumming on her shell was barely registered as the Queen looked down into the screen, and saw the ugliness staring back at her. Faded eyes. Body coated with muck and dirt made mud by blood becoming so stained on her shell it would remain until her next molt. Vents flaring hideously as they sung blasphemy. She struck the floating red cube, striking the message from existence as it was deleted from memory and existence.

Shaking. Dripping fear markers which dribbled down the hill and over the bodies of her children, knowing how it would bring many of them the terrors of sleep’s waking visions and yet unable to internalize care. Staring into the lights of the encampment flooding the terrain with brightness, and feeling that unholy glare look right back into her. Humanites lied. Humanites burnt worlds and blotted out suns. Humanites did not hesitate to kill, even when those they killed were like colonies unto an individual, a lifetime of potential and possibilities. Humanites turned entire colonies to ash. Skthveraachk needed to beat them. Which meant Skthveraachk needed not just to do as they did. Skthveraachk needed to be worse. The distress in the attendants was practically audible, but a flicking of her antenna sent them back to their task. Her breathing, taken beat by beat, steadying her insides to in turn steady her out. Her claw was trembling when it reached for the green box. It was steady by the time the bleeping emitted once again, and her image was a glow which hid the filth beneath.

“Ckhehnvraahll Queen, may your song be of a purity which shames the Triumvirate. I have had opportunities to contact you, but have chosen a time in which I could sing without disturbing your harmony. It is difficult here, on Dracan, and I am surrounded often by enemies which demand my fullest attention. Those drones formally of Ckhehnvraahll-Colony are kept from the fighting. Do not protest. They are skilled in agriculture, in tending, and such roles are more vital now than ever. My colony crests a hundred thousand voices. My children claim this world, piece by piece, for our Sovereignty superiors and the future of our people. These measures grow more and more difficult, but thoughts and memories of you give me the strength to thrust my scythes. I hope and ask in the Composer that I be returned to Kayyhaitch soon, but will await your next dance if such does not come to pass. Forgive my brevity, my vassal and Slough Queen. Each breath I labor is a breath sooner I return. May our unity endure, Once and Again.” Claw struck the confirmation light. The song was ended, saved, and sent to join those rest which would sail through cosmos of unending and abyssal dark. Orbs floated back to the tap-pad. Like a walker of dreams and sleeping sight, Skthveraachk deactivated the messaging function and touched at the glow which marked the treatise. The manual of combat and tactics. Victory was her role. Her role required no justification. For failure allowed no justification. Disgust was pushed back down to a deeper place than her thoughts could reach, and for long tenthmeasures, she let doubts scream their protests to empty corridors and passageways within her. And when her inner conflict was interrupted, it was less out of interest than pleasure at the distraction that she embraced it.

“A humanite is attempting to speak with a drone.”

“Purpose?”

“Unknown.” Deplorable word. “No banded are nearby.”

“Humanite is hostile?”

“Drone is located within mender’s circle. Humanite has traveled beyond the convoy limits and into the colony. Non-hostile.”

“What drone is being communicated with? Does the humanite have a known designation?”

“Drone, Skthveraachk menial-warrior. Humanite, female, one and three-tenths vertical length, scent indicators read presence at Battle of the Fallen Wyvern.” Queen puzzled. Another voice, instead, seizing control of the piece’s direction.

“Oh by sky and deeper sea, I didn’t think the alien would actually remember.” A few clacks of laughter emitted from the hillside occupants, asleep but still listening even now. Skthveraachk let their mirth touch her, warm her, her eyes focused upon the written words while mind bid the distraction grow.

“Skthveraachk scout, do I need to dispatch a thinker?”

“No. I am banded, I will assist. In, whatever this humanite wants.” The drone took his amended role seriously. Too seriously? Reaching through the link, she felt an embarrassment at the heightened attention. Queen was not the first to request sight. She was the six hundred and ninth.

“Accepted. You will assist the female humanite.”

“It is definitely female?”

“By all indications and silhouette, it is most likely.”

“Received. I will amend my report to Skthveraachk thinker. I was correct in my first guess.” Humanites did not enter the colony’s boundaries willingly, save out of duty, role, or one of the rare exceptions who had grown comfortable with their presence. The scout was at a full sprint from his echelon to the protected ring of soldiers set about the ring of wounded. Monitored by the menders, their sealant cleaned and reapplied as was needed as they furled around smooth rounded rocks coated with spit and warm fluid. And above it all, standing where all other formites were resting on all six, was a blue garbed female in suit and cap. Flanked, to the immediate suspicion and displeasure of the onlookers through the network of touch, by a single amber soldier. Only when the scout skidded to a halt, bringing his half-armored frame onto four legs, did distaste ebb; shockingly, both of them, amber and blue, were marked.

“I am Skthveraachk scout! I sing an ashamed soliloquy of explanation for not finding you as promised, humanite, but my role took me to guarding our colony’s borders from the most hateful Coalition.” The song was rife with unnecessary eloquence. Signals the aliens would never be able to parse with their limited dialect. But when the scout folded his scythes and made the bowing gesture, it readily strode clear within striking distance, and saluted.

The salute had caught the scout as confused as it did the amber, it appeared, from how the golden soldier spasmed as the female turned on it. Or, perhaps it was just the light which emitted from a crystal plate upon the blue’s shoulder, thrust to the amber’s face in her look back.

“The amber is marked. Its weapon remains on its back. I have never felt safer in one’s presence.” The amber’s face was hidden. It’s chuffing laughter, oddly calm. Scout’s scythes remained turned in as they unfolded, let rest across his core instead, to coincide with the dropping of the female’s salute. Humanites did not enter the colony’s boundaries. Humanites rarely saluted drones. Count was now nine hundred and eighty onlookers, not counting the menders who, despite their labors at both healing and dissecting the dead, had oriented their abdomens to conduct the greatest sound from the exchange. “Drones do not understand your language. We require the use of the Band to interpret your songs and notes. I have been directed to assist in whatever you need.”

“Skthveraachk Queen has directed me to assist in whatever you need.” In the light which the alien female controlled, face seemed to whiten and drain even as smile spread.

“Skthveraachk Queen, are you disturbed?” It was a question not vocalized to the humanites, sung instead through hairs of leg rubbed with brisk and mixed entertainment through the bonded limbs of the colony.

“I was previously disturbed. This exchange is disturbing only in the peculiar nature of its instigation.”

“Skthveraachk Queen is not disturbed.” Smile, again. Different. Relaxed. More at ease, as was the female’s posture as she walked about the perched bodies. Focused upon a menial who was frozen under the enormity of the colony’s regard now, a small drone which had had both its forelegs blown off. Melted. There was a vague memory, a report of protest from the menders are receiving the menial and the notion of wasting sealant upon it, but the delivery had been made by a humanite. Skthveraachk had not contested the order. “You are still wishing to…talk, with this drone?”

“Our intention is not to cause you harm. It is regrettable that our songs injure your receptors.” Initial confusion. Quick understanding.

There were many incongruities in that set of statements alone. Thinkers had begun to join in the relaying themselves, taking any opportunity to learn from direct humanite contact. The scout, however, was akin to a lumbrite in the rain. Stuck in the open, wishing only to crawl back beneath the soil and vanish. Still not nearly as offput as the menial, who by now had accepted that feigning torpor would not dissuade the humanite’s attention as she looked down upon the seated drone.

“I have been translating as we have been singing. I will…limit my own song, and serve as lungs for the menial-warrior. Consider my music, hers.” The scout sung for the colony. The humanite did not wish to speak to the colony. It wished to speak to a single, an individual. Menial warbled confused panic at the mere notion as the scout, and two thousand others, attempted to explain the concept. But, stuck as it was, it accepted the task with dutiful, if strained, determination.

“You want communication?”

Amber shuffled again, and as it stood next to the folded scout, there was almost a visible parallel in the confused discomfort the two shared. Female laughed. Menial did not understand the humor. It was a break in the solo, an invitation for the menial to join in. Drone merely continued to wait, expecting a question, an order, something. The humanite tapped its fingers together, looked about, tried to take a seat upon one of the empty stones, but shot up immediately as trails of goo stretched out from the contact.

“Yes.” Menial wished to stop there. Skthveraachk did not wish to interfere, to taint the exchange, but as the dead humanite’s writings told her of will, its imposition on the enemy and denial of allowing it imposed upon you, she urged the drone quietly to continue. “I was fulfilling my role. You are…unharmed?”

Knocking a hand on the suit, the clunk was pleasant but meaningless. Menial-warrior was struggling, Skthveraachk scout simplifying the notes as he could.

“Thanks is not expected.” Mandibles were chittering, trying to remain composed despite the heavy compliment. The oddity. The welcomeness. “I was fulfilling my role.”

“This is good. You are important. You must be kept safe.”

There was a motion the scout, and most others, attributed to a pointing without finger for the stubs of the menial’s forelegs. Menial did not understand the directive. So, order was ignored.

“Yes. But it is not important hurting. Hurt is to tell me there is danger. But there is no danger. So hurt can be ignored.”

“Humanites cannot?” There were a few hundred notes of surprise at the question, surprise which made the menial shrink inward slightly. Surprise at the curiosity shown by the least of drones. The humanite heard none of it, shaking her head with a sickly, boney spreading of its meat.

Scout fixed a look upon the amber’s own plated set of metal shell garb. Picturing within mind the notion of the dead metal having will of its own, like a small tank or vehicle.

“I will be present in the fighting next rise.”

Skthveraachk looked up from her tap-pad. Trying to see the hundred and twelve lengths to the mender’s circle with her own eyes. Trying to send the warning before the menial could respond. It was not successful.

“I will be unable to visit you. I will be dead next rise.” The laughter stopped. The bones, though relieving to see, were coated once more in expression of concern. Concentration. Skthveraachk did not think it right. But Skthveraachk, and parts of Skthveraachk, had begun to understand the expression the humanite now wore.

“I am not supposed to keep myself alive next rise. I am supposed to die next rise. It is my role.”

“It is my role.” The menial registered the humanite’s discontent. Tried to parse its origin. Skthveraachk held back the offers of more experienced drones and thinkers. This was not their exchange. The humanite wished to speak to a menial. It would speak with a menial. “There is a threat to the colony. A hill.”

“Yes. It is a threat. To the colony. To humanites. It is surrounded by a…” Struggle. Scout provided the notes. “Mihne-Field. Fire and danger, hidden beneath the ground. It must be cleared. Many of the colony and humanites will die otherwise.”

Something was off in the humanite. Something was fearful.

“If mihnes explode under soldiers, many soldiers will die. If mihnes are dug up, long time, many humanites may die. Menials will form three columns. Advance through the mihnes. Mihnes will explode.” Something was understanding. Something was horrified. “Way will be clear. Soldiers will be safe.”

“I do not understand. It is my role.”

Humanite technology. Humanite resources. Humanite lives. These things were expensive, valuable, important. Formite lives were not. Parts of Skthveraachk may have once seethed at the suggestion. Now? It was simply a fact. Menial did not understand this. Menial did not need to understand.

“It is my role.”

Animate. Moving. Anger and indignation, sadness hidden beneath rage. Signals thinkers now could register.

“One hundred and thirty-two are selected. I was selected because I am defective.” The menial was quick. Attentive. It saw now as before the unspoken question on the stretched flesh surrounding colored eyes, and answered without prompting by mimicking the female’s previous motion. Holding up the stubs of its forelegs. “I am defective. I am injured.”

Scout lengthed backwards as the volume increased, and the humanite drew nearer him.

“I cannot hold weapons.” Menial began to grow a shade of magenta frantic itself, trying to provide a steadying beat to the human’s wild allegro. “My scythes are gone. I cannot fight. I cannot haul. My eyes are too weak to observe. I cannot contribute to any role. I can contribute to this role.”

There was a rippling out from the center, the accusation, even if not translated, having its desired effect. Menial was torn between fear and anger. Skthveraachk murmured soothing hymns, passing on the story and sensations her attendants were yet engraving upon her.

“Your notes are cruel.” Anger won out, though it was heavily muted by station and role. Claws felt, seen, to curl and grip the underside of the rounded stone. “Queen is not wrong. You are wrong. I would eat what could be eaten by others. I would sleep where another could sleep. My life would deny another life. That is sickness. That is wrong.”

“I am home!” The scout tempered the drone’s own shout. But could not dilute the emotion. “This planet, home! Colony, home! I will die for my home!” Not if the menial had taken up its spear and thrust it through the alien would the female have recoiled further. The amber had shown greater and greater discontent at the discourse, and from the sounds of claws raking and occasional mandible snap from the lengths upon lengths of bodies, had more than once made to reach for its lance. The scout, each time, had mutedly apologized and assured that all was well. And in the silence, the humanite’s shock and menial’s return to shivering unhappiness brought the crescendo low once more. Brought the alien’s words tentative and careful once more.

“I am of my first cycle. Ninety-seven measures.” Obligation, engrained duty, brought answers even as the drone wished nothing more than to be left by the creature at the most rude question. But the rage had subsided from it. No longer able to hide that more mournful comprehension.

“I have not seen the world my colony comes from with my own eyes. I have listened to the songs. I have partaken in the memories. It is a strange place. The ground is green there. The water is not murky and still. The sky is blue during the rise.”

Hollowness. Harmony achieved, at last. But harmony was not a guarantee of pleasure, and just as Skthveraachk had recoiled upon her own revelations, there was the same mute sorrow within the female alien.

“The colony wishes to return. I would not wish to go there. This is where I was born. This is where I have lived.”

“I have lived.” Claws began to relax. Interruption not permitting the butchery of the name. “I have seen many rises. I have sung with the choir, and many others. I have been given suitable food. I-,” For a moment, remembering the eyes upon it, the menial hesitated. But despite the shyness implicit in sharing such, it continued almost bravely. “I even experienced two different resting visions. Though they were brief, and confusing. I do not know if humans have these. When the world changes as you sleep, and you see things that are not.”

Fluid was at the female’s triangular protrusion. Wiped aside.

“It was frightening. I attacked one of my sisters. The memories teach that they are natural, and occur infrequently. It was strange, but I am glad I only had two.” They looked at each other, the humanite orienting head down, to side, glancing away then returning to try and speak. Only to find focus shifted once more, to scout, amber, and back again.

There was not a need for elaboration. It came when answer was not immediate. Perhaps the alien expected a fast response. An easy reply. It looked to Skthveraachk scout, acting as though it thought he had refrained from translation. After forty-six breaths, the menial had found the notes it needed.

“I was born here. I will die here. I think, this is good. I have helped kill a humanite, and I saved a humanite. During the next rise, I will die, but I will save many in the colony. This is good.” The menial did not register the meaning in those wet, watery portals upon the alien’s face. It was not born with the capacity to touch the mind of the creature. When female saw female nod head, it expanded upon what it thought might be lost. “I am not scared of my final note. But, I am scared that, when it comes, I will not have succeeded my role. I am scared that I will be shot again. I am scared that I will not reach the mihnes. I am scared I will die for nothing.” Alien and alien. Humanite and formite. The blue shell tugged as the creature reached out. Placed a hand upon the menial. Did not smell or see the fear the drone emitted, softening its hairs and curling in its four remaining claws.

Skthveraachk watched it prepare to lie. Single beam was likely not to cause serious damage. Humanite’s armor would have protected it. Lie. Menial could not tell. Purpose?

“It was my role. Many think we cannot perform our role.” Purpose identified. The menial ceased emitting fear signals. Rubbed its antennae together, and bowed its head. “I have saved a humanite. I fulfilled my role. I accept your thanks. I give you thanks.” They parted. Said not a word further, even as the scout straightened and prepared to speak on, only to be met with the female’s back as she and the amber left in stuttered strides from the center of the ring. Left the menial upon the rock, trying even now to put pieces together that would not fit. “Skthveraachk Queen. Did I do well?”

“You have assisted colony. You have assisted humanites in understanding colony. You will be sung of in the memories. The Menial-Warrior who spoke with Humanites.” The drone glowed. Shuddered. Tried to sing, but only squeaked in its pull of the drawstring. “Return to torpor. You are required next rise.”

“Received. Thank you, Skthveraachk Queen. Thank you.” She followed the path of the humanites until both returned safely to the convoy. Ordering that the droplets of salty scent-marker the female had trailed from the site be covered over. Drone had fulfilled more than its role this fade. Drone would fulfill its role next rise. Skthveraachk wasted no more of the fade on pity or indecision. Some future measure, her choices could end her singing the Canticle of Forgiveness to the very Composer itself. Until then, there was only the task before them. The Drone had its role.

And the Queen had hers.