Chrysalis

So... I mean.. It’s a little odd...

I was a human before after all. I may not have lived what people would call a ... normal life ... but hey, I went to school, a bit, I saw people, I ate human food.

Now I have a giant ant Queen staring down at me and insisting that she and my many siblings are my family now.

...

For some reason I’m surprisingly ok with that.

I had a pet ant colony as a human, I kept them contained and fed them, watched the colony grow and cleaned out their spaces for them. In some ways they were the most constant members of my household, I certainly saw them every day, which wasn’t really true of anyone else.

Perhaps that is why I don’t really mind being an ant.

If I’m going to be a member of this family then I have to do my best to save them!

I start thinking out loud.

"Ok then, Queen, I don’t think we are uh, strong enough to survive the wave. If our nest is invaded from the outside as well as the inside, we could be completely wiped out!"

The Queen looks concerned and taps me with her antennae, urging me to continue.

"I think we need to move the colony! We have to get somewhere ... else. Somewhere safer".

"Do you know where we should go child?"

Err.... No?

We live in the Dungeon, and from what I’m told the entire place is going to become a death zone for up to a week!

I don’t even know that the surface will be safe from the impending danger!

...

it may be safer than

these tunnels, going to the surface might actually be better. Of course that doesn’t mean running headlong into the humans, that would be suicide, but with my Tunnel Map I can clearly see where the entrance I first encountered the humans is. If we can find a way to the surface far enough away from a human settlement, we might be able to remain undetected and ride out this

...

I get the colony to relocate to the surface there’s definitely a chance that we all get killed by those powerful human

down here, will the outcome

think we have to take a

inside my head. My resolution firms as I see her commitment to

have to dig a new tunnel to the surface!" I

Queen slowly digests this bombshell, taking time

Then she responds.

the ’surface’?" she

...

she possibly know

will dig a new tunnel upwards, that bypasses the existing Dungeon passages and if we can

that she can understand what I’m

suggestion. I wait nervously for her

my surprise

suggest child. Where should the family

my plan then I might have a chance of getting the workers to cooperate. I’m not exactly sure how the pecking order works

colony on a kind of democracy system. For example, if one worker finds a good place to move the nest, they’ll lay down a trail and start moving the brood. If other ants find the trail, they will go and check it out and if they agree with the first ants opinion, they will join in, eventually when enough workers have agreed on a course of action, it will happen. It isn’t always so smooth

though, the Queen is intelligent, not a mindless egg laying slave, and she is far from a helpless creature at the mercy of the workers. If anything, she is probably closer to what

clear that they can understand my pheromone language to

shake these thoughts out of my head and address the

can help get

is continuing to recede, just as the Sophos had predicted. The forest

few more friendly taps on the head with her antennae before retreating back to the security of the nest, leaving the workers to do what they do best and complete the work

the spoils of war. As more times goes by the number of ants showing visible signs of mutation is increasing, here and there a worker with

workforce becomes stronger then we will have a

proudly watch the workers rushing about, this is my family now and every one of these ants is my sibling. I didn’t have any brothers or sisters that I knew of in my last life, going from that