Hive Versus Hive

by Impossible Numbers

Caught in the Web

The centre of the Great Hall cracked and bulged. A gigantic heartbeat pulsed against it. Ripples wiped across the floor, up their Breezie legs, shaking their wings and manes. The Breezies huddled against the grand entrance, which stood wide open.

Seabreeze sat on the floor, trussed and smelling faintly of treacle. He strained to pull the bindweed apart, but yellow slime oozed over his legs and the bonds tightened instead. Beside him, Zephyrine flapped her wings as hard as she dared. Two Flutter Ponies grabbed a wing each with their tusks. She stopped flapping.

“What do you want!?” shouted Seabreeze. Flames rose inside his chest as he struggled. “Stop ignoring me!”

All the Breezies screamed when the floor smashed open. Fleshy pink worms popped out – no! Seabreeze spotted the snout behind them and heard the snorts. Among the “worms”, pink nostrils like the eye sockets of a skull twitched and quivered. A rounded head, brown as soil, curled up and turned round to face them. Shovel-like forelegs ploughed through the edge of the pit, knocking dirt and stone fragments across to them.

One of the Flutter Ponies stepped forwards and patted the thing on the snout. It pulled a little more of itself up, revealing its armoured chest and the first two spindly legs. Spikes ran down each leg, the teeth of a saw.

The Flutter Pony hissed and spat at the thing. When the creature chirped and shot back down into the hole, Piffle grunted and his eyes lit up.

“My word,” he said. “That’s a Star-nosed Mole Cricket, isn’t it? There were only supposed to be a hundred left in the wilds.”

Zephyrine cocked her head. “Can these creatures speak to us? I’m starting to feel left out.”

“They’re tracking someone.” Piffle sounded hopeful. “Maybe, if they find whoever they’re looking for, they’ll leave. It could be Queen Tailblade they want.”

“Don’t call her 'Queen'!” said Jingo Belle, whose eyes were darting to and fro in a futile effort to find escape. “It’s an invasion! A raid! A massacre! They’re going to take us prisoner and drag us back to their swamp!”

Gusto winced at the gaping hole; from a long way off, echoes of bashing shovels and crumbling tunnels came back to them. “They’ll never get away with this! No one can just come and destroy this place. Wait until we get them in the testing chamber. We’ll…” She mouthed the words, trying to work out the phrase. “We’ll throw a book at them.”

No one dared to say anything more. Down below, the dungeons spread out under the pond and under the hill and even, some said, under the distant hillocks. They used to be known as the catacombs.

Breezies didn’t like going down there, but they all knew the stories. The soil around the portal had magical properties. Nothing placed within it would age. Time stood still down there. It was the perfect place for storage.

If the invaders find out what is down there… “We need muscle,” whispered Seabreeze.

“Why whisper?” said Piffle airily. “They can’t understand Breezie. It took me weeks to learn their language. We should be OK.”

“But the ones who caught us could speak it.” Zephyrine glanced nervously at the two gripping her wings. Gossamer could tear all too easily. She was barely breathing.

“So did the ones who caught us. They could barely speak any words. Neither of our tribes have much contact with each other. I think we should be safe.”

Another Flutter Pony stepped forwards. Breezie recognized the type. Not the face, of course, but the flint inside each eye, the way the lips flickered slightly, the tensed, claw-like rake of its limbs. He’d seen body language like that from Zephyrine when she’d been younger. This creature was one flicker away from a pounce.

“If it sets your mind at ease,” said the Flutter Pony crisply, “I can understand every word you say. Any tricks, and I will feed you to the Mole Cricket.”

Unlike the other Flutter Ponies, her tusks were straight and never clicked. Seabreeze stopped struggling. He wished the universe would go back to when he was prodding pillbugs. Suddenly, a future full of that was inviting.

“Why are you destroying our palace!?” he snapped; even now, the flames of outrage roared and pushed his head forwards, so he had to crane his neck at her. “This is madness! When every creature in the realm finds out, you will not have a place to hide! This is enchanted ground! You are supposed to show it respect!”

The Flutter Pony blinked until the echoes died away. “Oh. Are you the ‘Big Breezie’ of your swarm, then?”

Flames rushed into Seabreeze’s cheeks. “You have no manners at all! What a disgrace you are to this beautiful world! Everyone else has learned how to live peacefully, and you come along, scaring everyone, bursting into our homes –”

“What is your name?” The question cracked like a whip.

“Seabreeze, shut up,” whispered Zephyrine. “You’re only making it worse.”

“Seabreeze. I see,” said the Flutter Pony with a triumphant smirk. She ignored the glare Seabreeze shot at his partner, who had the decency to blush and look away. “My name is Dragon Lily. I’m tracking a runaway – you may have heard of her – called Tailblade. She is our…” The creature glanced up as though checking an answer on the ceiling. “It’s hard to translate, but I think ‘Voice’ would cover it.”

“Voice Tailblade?” said Gusto.

“The actual word is ‘Vox’.” Piffle turned to the hole in the ground. “You only had to ask.”

An outburst of hissing and spitting ran across the gathered Flutter Ponies. Dragon Lily responded in kind. She seemed suddenly angry, but that might have just been the way the language was spoken.

Seabreeze watched the rain of spittle and listened to their chitter-chatter jabbing in his ears, and willed himself to take a deep breath and close his eyes and think. Deep in his chest, the flames still flickered, but they were dwindling. He had no idea where Saltshaker was.

I never wanted to shout at others. They make it too easy, though. Maybe I need to try harder and not forget that they are living beings, too. They might be secretly as scared as we are. He coughed, silencing the ruckus and drawing the attention of all eyes and antennae.

“We do not want any trouble,” he said as politely as he could. “Please try to understand us. Miss Tailblade was trying to get through the Ring Portal when she should not have done so.”

A flicker passed through Dragon Lily’s eyes, but he could’ve imagined it.

“We were only trying to stop her from going out into the Big World. It is our duty to keep her safe, just like we keep everyone else safe.” Behind him, Jingo Belle began to whimper. “We all decided that the right thing to do would be to keep her here so she could not sneak out. Miss Tailblade is not in any danger.”

This didn’t get any response. Nervously, he tried a slight bow, flaring his Breezie wings slightly as he did so. “I am sorry for any trouble we have caused you. If you promise to leave us peacefully, we will show you where she is.”

Nothing but the distant crashing of the Mole Cricket punctured the silence. He could feel every gaze plunging through his mass of a mane to stab the back of his neck. Tusks clicked together.

If he was right, and body language never lied, then Dragon Lily would nod and smile and, if he was really lucky, mean every gesture. A whole Flutter Pony hive could keep a tighter watch on one of their own easily; they’d only have to learn their mistake, and it was unlikely to be repeated if they had enough power to snatch a whole Breezie village in minutes.

The stillness was getting to him. No one looked remotely ready to congratulate him yet on his kindness. Perhaps he’d said something rude about their Vox without noticing. Perhaps they were making their minds up for an attack.

Risking a glance round, he saw his own Breezies looking at him in the same way. Piffle took a step away from him.

Why? he thought irritably. That is exactly what we did do, and it is exactly what we want. We have always kept the Ring Portal safe since the beginning. Everyone knows that.

Gusto was turning red. He must have trodden on some pony rule she’d picked up, and by the looks on the Breezies’ faces, she’d passed it around. Pressing into each other tightly, Hugglenut and Milktears shivered head-to-head. Breezies ran from danger until they had to go on a Forage, and then only when there was a pegasus or griffon nearby. Jingo Belle gaped at him as though he was mad.

Only Zephyrine was beaming at him, but one of the tusks tightened and the smile ducked back down quickly.

Finally, Dragon Lily’s legs slackened. She went from preparing to pounce, straight to towering over him.

“I’m afraid that is impossible,” she said curtly. “Honourable as your aims were, no one is allowed to harm a Flutter Pony. To harm one of us is to harm all of us. The hive does not bow down to you.”

“But do you not see!” Seabreeze tried a step forwards, forgot about the binding, and smacked his chin on a fragment of stone. Underground, the Mole Cricket rumbled through a passage, and he felt every tremor through his jaw. “We have children and elderly Breezies! We were protecting Miss Tailblade –”

“Vox, Mister Seabreeze,” snapped Dragon Lily. “Vox Tailblade.”

“Did you want her to get lost in the Big World?” The fire roared in his chest again, propelling his words on the updraft. “If we did anything, we saved her life! You should be thanking us!”

“Arrogant fairies!” She was ready to pounce, tusks almost touching his eyelashes. “This is not your world, and we are not your slaves. We will not be told what to do by butterfly ponies like you. We will retrieve our Vox, and then we will decide what to do with you Breezies. This talk is at an end.”

With a rumble, the star nose rose out of the pit and the Mole Cricket chirped at the ceiling. Dragon Lily spat and hissed at it, and then did the same to the Flutter Ponies. Half of the creatures rained down on the hole as a squad, obscuring the Mole Cricket, and then Cricket, Dragon Lily, and Flutter Pony squad were gone. A faint humming from the black pit died away.

“Evil creepy-crawlies,” whispered Jingo Belle, sneering at the ones staying behind. “They need to be stopped.”

“What did you think you were doing?” said Gusto at once. Seabreeze rolled over to see her craning her neck forwards at him. “There’s a right way to do this.”

“Rules again?” sighed Zephyrine, and her wings were released. She massaged them back into shape. “They’re not gonna help us. And don’t you talk to him like that! It was worth a try. If he’d gotten through to them, they would’ve left us alone.”

Both Hugglenut and Milktears gave a bark of a laugh. They were still trembling. Neither of them seemed to be seeing anything on this plane of existence.

“Well, I thought it was mad,” said Piffle. “Don’t you remember what Tailblade was like? A whole hive of that could be capable of anything.”

Zephyrine rounded on him. “I thought you said they could think. You were the one trying to stand up for that intruder.”

Piffle narrowed his eyes. “I made a mistake. The Flutter Ponies I met on my travels must have been a different hive. They didn’t invade villages and towns, and they certainly didn’t treat me like this.”

“Then they’re not naturally evil, then,” said Zephyrine triumphantly. “There must be more to this than we’re seeing –”

Seabreeze, who’d been lying silently on the ground and watching them go back and forth, cleared his throat. “Zephyrine, you do not have to defend me.”

She spluttered, gaped at him, and opened her mouth with a glare in her eyes.

“No! Listen! They are not going to be nice to us if we ask. I made a mistake, too.” He hung his head, more to avoid looking at her than to avoid looking at the disapproving glares he was getting. “If niceness does not work, then toughness will.”

“But –”

“So you’ll help us?” said Milktears. Her voice was on the edge of cracking. “You were one of the Last Minuters. You must think of something! Anything!”

The others greeted this with interested murmurs. For the moment, his idiocy was pushed to one side.

That is how Breezies work, he realized. That is how we live. If we see a shadow, we move for the light. We think we are being watched, so we duck under a rocky overhang or hide in a knothole. Most of all, anything bigger than us is either something to flee from or something to stick close to. Maybe the early Breezies did not make a bargain with the ponies for milk. Maybe they forced us to do it. After all, we had nowhere else to run to.

Now they are looking at me like I am some pegasus caretaker. It is Fluttershy all over again! I am the only Last Minuter here. I am not a real Breezie. I am not right in the head. This is madness.

“We will…” he said. “We will…” Think Breezie. Forget all that stuff Fluttershy said. Think Breezie, not pony. “We could send someone through the Ring Portal to get help. There are griffons out there who could help us, and they could take care of these wasps easily.”

The Breezies skewed their lips and glared at the guarding Flutter Ponies. It had the right shape of a Breezie plan…

“But no one’s ever ventured out during the wait before,” said Hugglenut. “No one who’s come back, anyway.”

“Drive them out!” Jingo Belle vibrated with excitement, licking her lips and dancing on the spot. “The Last Minuter could do it. No one’s ever returned at the last minute before, until Seabreeze did it.”

“No! There are rules,” insisted Gusto, but no one cared to listen.

Zephyrine stared at Seabreeze until he finally met her gaze, and then she blinked and shook her head. “Forget the rules. My partner is not going out there. He got lucky last time.”

“We need lucky Breezies,” whined Milktears.

“I’ll go with him too,” said Piffle. “I’m used to travelling around strange places in this world. Maybe it’s about time I tried it in the Big World. Anyway, we don’t have a better plan.”

“Are you forgetting these?” hissed Zephyrine, nodding at the bindweed dripping with yellow ooze.

“No. ‘These’, in fact, can be part of the plan, if we can think of one…”

While the other Breezies talked, Seabreeze turned away before his partner nailed him with a glare. This time, the flames burned under his cheeks.

---

Comments

[redmar]

What thae Flutterpony says reminds strongly of the Ice Warrior from the Doctor Who episode Cold War. Grandmarshall Skaldak had the same philosophy of if you harm one of us you harm us all.