Chrysalis

“MORE POWER, DAMMIT!”

“We don’t have any more! We don’t have the power!”

“It’s so close. So close! Empty the tanks, we need every drop!”

“But… but that’s madness!”

“It’s not madness… it’s BRILLIANT!”

Electricity crackled, lightning flashed and sparks fell like rain from overhead as the ants scurried to follow the orders of their leader. Atop her observation spire, Brilliant cackled, her mandibles snapping together in a staccato rhythm as the flashes and explosions lit her from below, projecting her demented shadow onto the wall.

“Th-th-the b-backup m-m-matrix is collapsing!” Assistant whimpered.

“It’s fine, we have three backups!”

“This IS the third backup!” Experimant roared.

“Not to worry, I installed a secret fourth backup matrix and didn’t tell you!”

“That’s just a lie, isn’t it?!”

Another explosion rocked the chamber and Brilliant teetered on the edge of her spire, a hair's breadth from losing her grip and falling into the swirling maelstrom of light below. The many-faceted eyes of the mage were filled with an unearthly glow, and for a long moment, Experimant was convinced she’d finally lost her mind.

“Dump the tanks and then hit the cages!” she shouted and hundreds of lab ants rushed to follow her orders.

“Th-th-th-th-th-this will overflow the matrix for sure!” Assistant said.

carrying you to the cages,” Experimant replied as she snatched up the smaller ant, threw

who w-w-w-will save the

she’s beyond

of liquid mana emptied, sending the volatile substance flowing through the underground pipelines and into the gate matrix. As predicted, the matrix blew almost instantly, rocking the chamber once more and sending deadly blasts of unstable

SEE EVERYTHING!” Brilliant roared. “I

down from her spire, so close to the unstable mass of power she could reach out and touch it. Within her

“L-l-leader! Be c-c-careful!”

“BAH! CALL ME BRILLI-”

gate flashed white, then expanded rapidly, enveloping the entire room in a second. Brilliant never got a chance to complete her

debris rained down from above. The chamber had been built to withstand magic detonations, but

room stopped shaking and Experimant felt confident enough to

get a quick headcount?

here,” Brilliant said, emerging

course you are…” Experimant

to know how I

“Not really-”

front leg. “And that was the best experiment we’ve run so far! The results

“Y-y-you're alive?” Assistant mumbled.

Come on, all of you out of the

Experimant grumbled as she helped the rest of the lab-ants emerge from

main ones. But that’s fine, I got a good

then realised she said it out loud, went to apologise, then shrugged

off hand, “I can project it if necessary. My brain, that is. Come on! We are on the verge of

about, shouting and exclaiming all the while. Assistant hesitantly made her way

come on, come on, come on… YES!” Brilliant punched the air with her two front legs as an array embedded into a reinforced stone pillar flickered to life. “Someone extract the

rushed off to another one. When that refused to work, she savaged it with a bite before running to the next. In short order, she’d either repaired or fatally damaged all ten of the outer detectors and started poring over

kick of power we got by infusing the liquid mana was just what we needed.