***Tirnanog, The Mycelium***

***Charmaine Pinault***

“Larvie, larvie, larvie! Come here and get your larvas!” Charm threw another handful of woodlarvas to her pets, making sure all of them would get some. In reality, she just wanted them to come closer to the security wall so she could have a look at them.

The yellow shroomheads were always more timid than the greyish, a little shrivelled ones. Probably because they were younger. If Charm didn’t make sure they would get their fair share, there would be no woodlarvas left for the prettier shroomheads by the time the others were done. Then they wouldn’t come closer to the wall for Charm to study.

She was a little sad that the violet shroomhead didn’t make an appearance today. The violet one showed up only occasionally, but she was the prettiest of them all.

The girl leaned against the protective balustrade when she saw something violet peek out through the window of a ransacked and dilapidated house. When nothing showed up, Charm thought it must have been only her imagination, so she continued throwing her woodlarvas strategically so she could attract as many of the shroomheads as possible.

Long ago, the village had been much larger, but nowadays the lower levels were left to rot. There just weren’t enough settlers left to keep everything intact.

The adults thought Charm didn’t understand the dire situation with her eleven years of age, but she understood well enough that the community was slowly dying. A year ago, there had been a boy of Charm’s age in the village, but he got eaten by the shroomheads.

Stupid Lesner had listened to their calls and promises despite the adults’ warnings.

Some of the shroomheads stayed intelligent for a while after they got infected and that was Lesner’s doom. When he climbed over the balustrade, they snatched him!

And no more Lesner.

Charm could still remember his cries and the adults trying to save him. But there was nothing to be done once he was all scratched up without the mutations to withstand the infection. And within a few days, he was one of the shroomheads.

“Charmaine Pinault.”

Charm stiffened when she heard her father’s voice behind her.

Slowly, she turned around and smiled at him, hoping he wouldn’t be too mad.

His eyes narrowed as his stern gaze wandered to the woodlarvas in her hand. “What have I told you about playing outside the village’s inner ring?”

Charm sighed and looked down at the ground. “I am not supposed to leave the inner ring. Or the house, if possible.”

“And?” he urged.

“And no feeding the shroomheads,” Charm added reluctantly.

“And?” Her father didn’t let go of the matter.

She blinked innocently, hoping to persuade him with her innocence, but he had gotten wise to her persuasive skills some time ago. It had been possible to avoid punishment while he believed she wasn’t capable of understanding what she was doing, but not anymore.

Father pointed at her hand. “Where did you get the woodlarvas?”

“Do not climb the coraltree,” Charm added dutifully another prohibition. There were so many dangerous and forbidden things to do in the village, sometimes Charm believed the only safe thing for her was to lie down in her bed till she was a grown-up like the other villagers. At least then, the adults wouldn’t be able to command her around any longer.

Balthasar shook his head and looked at the sky as if he was the one in trouble. “I think you already know what this means.”

Charm tried her luck. “One-week house arrest.”

“One for feeding the shroomheads.” Her father nodded gravely. “And another one for climbing onto the coraltree to collect woodlarvas.”

Charmaine couldn’t help herself and let out an indignant shriek at the unfairness of the world when her father grabbed her arm and pulled her away from the balustrade. How else was a single girl supposed to entertain herself with nothing but boring adults around in this boring village made up of boring things?

***Tirnanog, The Old Camp***

***Conla Leece***

I let out a groan when someone began frantically knocking on my door. The knocking was loud by a normal human’s standards, but to my sensitive ears, it felt like one explosion going off after another.

Couldn’t they wait for just a few minutes before bothering me with the next crisis? It was impossible to concentrate on my work with so much noise and I was already behind with my paperwork!

I never should have taken this job. There was always something requiring my attention and nobody to delegate important decisions to. In the early days of taking over the bunker, Tianna had helped out a lot. Unfortunately, she was the matriarch’s right hand and had to return to Jeng as soon as things were settled here.

And since the Hochberg only ever intended to fulfil a supervising role on this mission, they hadn’t brought enough people to warrant their own commanders.

Only Elder Bruce Patel was there to help out… sometimes…

Bruce wasn’t the administrator type and preferred to be out and about on scouting missions after handing out orders. Which was likely why I was interrupted yet again when I was busy with bookkeeping and missives!

“Stop knocking! Stop and come in!”

A distressed warrior opened the door. “The wormhole is open and people are coming through!”

Rubbing my tired eyes, I pushed the documents aside and hurriedly followed his lead out of the bunker. Earth wasn’t expected to send us more exiles. Not yet at least. The wormhole wasn’t in use during winter and it was too early for Earth to return to their normal schedule.

So, the only reason for the wormhole to be open was for Magnus’s people to be coming through. I would have preferred to be better informed about what was coming, but Magnus himself didn’t know the exact details of what his people would do.

If things had gone as planned the organisation should have received a message about Magnus securing our aid on Tirnanog. What they would do with this information depended on how things looked back on Earth.

We arrived at the pool in front of the bunker only to witness a scene of utter madness.

The wormhole was open exactly where it was supposed to be – about ten metres above the water.

Normally, Earth tended to drop off their female exiles in this spot so they wouldn’t be hurt too badly by the fall. From what I knew, it still wasn’t a pretty affair, but at least the water prevented deaths.

Only this time, this safety measure was being tested to its limit as a seemingly endless stream of people and material poured forth from the portal.

Too many for the pool to take, so I quickly began to shout out orders for my men. The area beneath the portal had to be cleared out quickly to prevent unnecessary injuries.

Some of the crates which were haphazardly being dropped through the portal floated, so they also had to be moved of the way! Else someone would fall on them and get injured.

Then there was the problem of people falling onto each other!

The wormhole wasn’t supposed to be used like this!

I had my warriors form several rows to clear the area beneath the portal with haste, but no matter what we did, things were getting away from us as the frequency of men and women coming through the gate ramped up.

Judging by their jumpsuits, some of them were exiles. There were also people in military uniforms and suits, worker’s clothes and casual outfits. It looked like someone was shoving through all the people who just happened to be at the gateway facility at the time.

Why?

I wanted nothing more than to keep order in my camp, but at some point, I simply had to choose between letting the newcomers roam free and maintaining control of the bunker. So I ordered my men to shove everyone and everything off to the side and let them see to their well-being.

The courtyard in front of the bunker already looked like a dump and I was beginning to worry whether we would simply have to let things be and allow everything to pile up beneath the portal.

Fights were also breaking out among these newcomers, but all I could do at the moment was to send out a few groups who would forcibly pacify the crowd. Thankfully, I had ordered my men to disarm everyone when the first camouflaged soldier with a gun came through the portal.

Disarming them would have been no problem in any case, since humans with only basic enhancements coped badly with Tirnanog’s bright sun and arrived blinded and encumbered by the higher gravity. It was still a surprise that not a single shot had been fired so far and that the armed people who came through the wormhole were generally cooperative.

What felt like an eternity passed, but it couldn’t have been more than half an hour before the flow of people and material came to a trickle and halted completely.

Three last figures fell through the portal and landed between drifting crates before they were pulled to shore by my people.

So far, nobody had identified themselves to be in charge. Some men and women had announced themselves to belong to the organisation and that this was their operation. The few people I had questioned always said the leaders would come last.

I crossed my arms and gave the trio my best glare when the two men and one woman were pulled out of the pool.

Hopefully, they had a really good explanation for dumping this mess to my feet!

What was I supposed to do with...

I looked around, trying to come up with a quick ‘guesstimation’ of how many people had arrived – whether willingly or unwillingly. To my dismay, it was impossible to overlook the crowd.

But if I was right about this debacle lasting around half an hour with a person coming through the wormhole every two to three seconds, then I was looking at a number between 600 to 900 people. Maybe slightly more.

So, worst case scenario, I had now up to a thousand dependants without mutations on my hands!

One of the men, an older fellow with grey hair, bowed like some old-school gentleman while using a hand to shield his eyes from the sun. He somehow managed to make it appear dignified despite looking like a wet socket and the unfamiliar gravity warring with his body.

The trio looked well aged, but athletic for Earthers. No doubt, they had their fair share of medical treatments as far as these things went for the general population. Nonetheless, I was sure they would have faced retirement in a few years if they hadn’t chosen to come here.

A starfish mutation would fix the problem of age soon enough.

“I am Gunnar Elrod, Miss. I hope Magnus announced our arrival?”

The gentleman looked around, scanning the crowd. “I believe all of us are here, so there is no longer a need for the portal.” Gunnar lifted a device he had held firmly in his hand so far.

It looked like a deadman switch and I stiffened at the sight.

Before I could stop him, he removed a cap with his thumb and pressed a button before throwing the device over his shoulder, it having fulfilled its purpose.

A second later, the wormhole above us closed and was gone.

Since nothing had happened, I abandoned my first thought of him being some sort of suicide bomber. “What did you do?”

Gunnar smiled. “I just nuked the Tibet Gateway. For now, we don’t have to worry about our enemies getting more assistance from Earth. At least on this continent. I think you would appreciate it if the three of us help to sort out the crowd behind you. Between storming the gateway facility and trying to minimize casualties, we kind of ended up shuffling our people, exiles, and gateway personnel together.”

***Tirnanog, Jeng, The Ancient Grove***

***Loopsfast***

Loop was a very busy drake right now. He had to see to it that his brood always had the right temperature. He had to turn the eggs so they wouldn’t lay too long on one side. He had to make sure the moisture was right and there was no mould. He had to do so many things.

He kind of wished his females would help with the caretaking. Where were they anyway?

Loop pondered the problem of his missing females for a moment before his thoughts returned to the eggs.

Counting them again, he made sure none of them was missing. One nest held four and the other five.

Although, the fifth egg from the larger clutch looked unhealthy and it didn’t feel like it had the right weight.

Loop studied the egg sadly, remembering the hatching lore taught by his father. Sometimes, eggs just didn’t come out right. Sometimes, they got infected with parasites. In any case, the bad egg had to be dealt with or a drake risked the loss of the entire brood.

The young father was conflicted about getting rid of an egg, but he had two broods anyway. More than any normal drake could hope for.

He was fairly certain the females wouldn’t remember the number of eggs they had laid anyway, so Loop removed the bad egg from his nest and rolled it out of the nesting hangar until it fell off the humans’ flying colony.

It disappeared in the forest below and Loop stared after it for a moment, mourning the loss.

Then his thoughts returned to the other eggs. It was time to turn them! No, he had done that a moment ago! Temperature! Yes, he had to control the temperature!