The Hives of Titan

I would kill every one of my brother breeders to have the Queen to myself. But this one, I would kill just for the pleasure of watching him die.

A tender knelt beside me. In my pheromone-induced frenzy, I nearly shoved it away. Then I recognized it. No, her. The tender who wished she were the Queen.

She tied a second blade to my ankle. "May your seed propagate." She helped me to my feet.

Then I turned from her.

Before me, workers stood at attention along the passage to the Queen's chamber. My brothers--my enemies--were already within. Lust and murder boiled in my soul. I took a step, then another, the pheromones drawing me in. Behind me, the workers rolled a large stone.

We were sealed inside.

* * * * *

The few glowstones in the Queen's chamber emitted a dim ultraviolet. My eyes adjusted.

I had never been in a chamber this large. The dome arched majestically overhead, covered in crystals of diamond and quartz. Chunks of xenon ice littered the polished mica floor. Hunters brought the ice from the frozen surface to cool the Queen...

the Queen!

She was a seductive mountain of royal flesh, a thousand times our size. She ate with her sumptuous mouth hole at one tapered end. At the other, she excreted. In her midsection, uncountable luscious legs trembled, each one larger than a worker, yet far too small to carry her sublime mass. The humid air was drenched with her intoxicating aroma. It seduced me, drew me closer. She towered voluptuously over me as I approached.

This was no illusion created by her pheromones. I wanted her. I wanted to fertilize her eggs and father her children. I was in love with my Queen--A monster, a beast, a woman.

In my Reve-frenzied mind, the Queen had been waiting for me and me alone. She quivered at my appearance. Every sensuous pore in her body opened for me. Rivulets of sweat ran in frenzied streaks over her fleshy mound. Her stubby feminine legs undulated, hypnotizing me, enticing me forward.

If I had kept my wits, I would've attacked then, while my brother breeders were as enchanted as myself. But my irresistible desire to copulate precluded all other action. I knew I would kill. But that could wait. I needed this first, needed it more than life itself.

Her many orifices hid coyly within her abdomen. Hoping to find one, I approached her legs--towering above me, rounded fleshy stubs that trembled at my touch. Oiled and shaved as I was, I slipped between them, and she embraced me with a gentle squeeze. Surely this was why us breeders were so small. No worker or hunter could fit into such a tight space.

Where her legs joined her massive body, a forest of dark hair grew, covering her abdomen from the floor to above my head. As I parted the hair, I found the source of her heady aroma. Her moist flesh folded in on itself, forming swollen maroon lips that hung heavy from a protruding nub. Copious nectar oozed from within, making the lips glisten in the dim light. At my touch, her slick lips trembled. Parting them released slow dribbles of nectar that puddled at my feet. Inside, another pair of lips, and as I parted those, a third--lips within lips, delicate and beautiful.

I inhaled the intoxicating odor. So beautiful was she that I rubbed her opening with my face, drinking her rich fluids. The lips parted and stretched as if the Queen's hunger for penetration would swallow my entire head.

Drunk with her taste and aroma, my throbbing propagator took control and penetrated her outer lips. We fit as if designed by some omniscient creator. Her lubricated folds took me, gripped me, drew me in deeper. With every heave of her enormous bulk, the nub above her orifice rubbed against the oiled flesh of my belly. I buried my face in her luxurious hair. Her swollen lips pulsated around me in a heavenly massage. We were made to be together.

I thrust into her, taking her orifice as I had the tender's excretion hole. Again and again I pumped myself into her sopping folds. Her musky nectar spattered with every clench of her swollen lips, marking me, making me smell like her. I wanted to do the same, to mark her orifice with my seed.

She pulled me in, thrust after fevered thrust. My propagator had swollen to a delirious ache. Veins pulsed in tangled knots around my rigid ochre shaft. Her hungry lips sucked and kissed, begging my seed from it. My seed sac slapped obscenely against her sensuous quivering flesh. I clawed at her hair, pulling it to force myself ever deeper.

My very core spasmed. My muscles seized and clenched. A sensual madness engulfed me, and I flooded her with my seed. Great jets pumped forth, filling her, fertilizing her, marking her as my own. Her lips squeezed and pulled, sucking every drop I had. Gobs of white seed spurted out around my throbbing propagator until I stood in a puddle of my own slick essence.

As I backed away, her lips close, embracing my seed within her.

I breathed hard, but had no time to rest. Many orifices awaited. Many brother breeders to kill.

After I backed away from her majestic beauty, I sought another pair of legs--and the orifice they promised. Instead I found a breeder, with his back to me, lost in his copulation ecstasy.

I pulled the blade from my armband and sliced into the back side of his abdomen. A hissing sound escaped his mouth parts as he fell to the floor.

From a forest of dark hair, the velvety orifice beckoned me with swollen parted lips. Inside it, I knew, another egg vault, waiting for seed. My propagator was still hard, and it would remain so until the last orifice had been fertilized--or until some breeder took my life, whichever came first. I stepped over his limp body and took his place. Her protruding nub quivered at my touch, and as I stood in the growing puddle of my brother's warm blood, I penetrated her.

Again, we moved in a steady rhythm. She took me deep, caressing me with her many lips, rubbing her nub against my oily belly. My muscles clenched, and I spasmed, spilling forth another load of seed. I thrust again and again until her orifice had filled. White seed from my propagator dribbled from her lips and mixed with the blood at my feet.

I withdrew from her and caught my breath. I had to be careful now. I would kill to fertilize, and the other breeders would kill me just as quick. Many orifices remained, many egg vaults waited for seed. The last breeder alive would fertilize them all.

Carefully, I moved away from her orifice. A hissing cry from the far side of the chamber--the weak died from the blade, the strong fertilized. The Queen's undulating legs provided good cover. I stayed close, moving around one huge fleshy leg stub, and my blade at the ready, glistening with blood. Another orifice; fresh white seed dribbled from its closed lips and puddled on the stone below. The breeder who fertilized her was not far away.

Rounding her leg, I found him, penetrating yet another orifice, lost in pleasure and oblivious to my presence. He would be an easy kill. I reached around his thorax and sliced with my blade. Her orifice gripped at his propagator, and when his collapsing body robbed her of it, her pouting lips drooled puddles of clear nectar.

My urge to take the orifice was strong, but my will to live stronger. I slipped away from her heavenly flesh to check the chamber beyond her legs. With some assurance I would not be attacked, I slipped back within her folds and took in the intoxicating beauty of her swollen lips and throbbing nub.

As I prepared to penetrate her, a breeder climbed over her fleshy round leg and dropped on me from above. I caught his wrist in my hand and bent his blade to his own propagator. Horrified, he dropped the blade. Fool. I unsheathed my own and sliced his thorax.

I was within her orifice before his body hit the ground. The caresses of her nested lips coaxed and begged my seed. As my last spasms filled her with my goopy load, a hissing cry pierced the chamber--the cry of another breeder meeting his fate. It faded to a silence interrupted only by the pounding heartbeat in my ears.

Before I withdrew, I caught my breath. The rounded hills of her stubby legs trembled as I moved around them.

Working my way between two legs, I found a grisly sight. A fertilized orifice, swollen and pungent, dribbled white seed onto the dead body of a breeder. Blood seeped from his many stab wounds. The one who killed him had seeded this orifice.

So many orifices remained unfertilized, beckoning me with their swollen lips and glistening pungent fluids. I wanted to fertilize. My throbbing propagator begged for it. But a dead breeder fertilizes no orifices. I passed orifice after swollen orifice, telling myself how much sweeter she would taste when she was mine, when the other breeders were dead. Fertilizing would be my just reward.

From around the curve of a leg, I saw two breeders facing off, their oily bodies glistening in the dark ultraviolet. I would wait for one to fall, then take the victor. One was already wounded. Blood trickled down his abdomen from a shallow cut. After another thrust from his opponent, he collapsed.

The victor turned his bald head, and I recognized him.

"Larva," he said. His mouth parts sneered. Flecks of blood dripped from his head and abdomen. He kicked at his dead opponent, and its body rolled in an expanding pool of its own blood. "You're next."

I stayed where I was, next to the Queen's massive leg. My best defense was to wait for his attack. I quieted my breath, prepared, and crouched.

He charged and stabbed his blade at my face.

I grabbed his wrist. If my hold slipped, his blade would cut me open.

With my free hand, I thrust my blade. But he was quick. He held my arm fast, and I could not stab him no matter how hard I pressed.

We were stalemated. Our arms and bodies quivered as we strained to end the deadlock.

With one quick move, he slammed my blade hand into his raised knee. The blade reflected jagged shards of ultraviolet as it spiraled away.

"Die, larva!"

He jerked his wrist free and prepared to plunge his blade into my abdomen. I landed a well-placed kick and knocked him away from the Queen. His blade flew from his grip and skittered across the polished floor. He rose to his feet. His eyes were merciless. "I'll kill you with my bare hands."

He landed a blow to my face, and I fell to the ground.

If only I had my blade... But I did--a spare, strapped to my ankle.

Before I could reach it, he was on me, his hands tight on my thorax. Our abdomens pressed against our hard propagators. There was no heart in his eyes, only hatred, pure and dark. Angry veins pulsed across his shaved oily head.

He squeezed my thorax. My body was starved for air and blood. I felt my muscles weakening.

With one last desperate move, I raised my knee into his seed sac.

He flinched--just enough for me to reach the blade at my ankle.

Angry, he pressed my thorax hard.

That was when I cut.

His grip weakened. His angry eyes widened and softened.

Time stopped. He stared at me. In his eyes, the dim reflections of glowstones froze.

His mouth parts opened. A hiss escaped. Quiet at first, then louder, until it screamed--screamed like a soul drawn down to eternal torment.

His body collapsed beside me.

I stood, my hands on my knees, breathing hard.

"Fucking bastard!" I kicked his head.

I pulled my knife from his belly. Before I sheathed it, I severed his propagator.

Was he the last, or did others remain? I turned, my blade at the ready. But the bodies of my brother breeders littered the floor--and I was last!

The Queen was mine!

Her huge body trembled in the dim ultraviolet of the glowstones, deep in the throes of Reve, hungry and unsatisfied. The chamber was silent but for the wet sound of her legs slapping impotently against the polished floor. Deep in the crevices between those legs, orifices waited, begging for my seed.

I approached her. Her aroma hung heavy in the humid air. If I could choose a single scent to inhale for the rest of my life, it would be her scent--dank, pungent, and exciting. My antennae drank in her odor, and my propagator ached in response.

Shaved and oiled, I squeezed between her legs to the forest of dark hair at her abdomen. Within her hair, I beheld the beauty of her moist and delicate folds, lips that hung like maroon curtains from her swollen nub. The engorged lips of her orifice glistened, moist with nectar that oozed and dripped onto the polished floor. I pressed against my Queen, rubbing my hard propagator against her wetness, losing myself in the forest of her downy hair. I bent to suckle her swollen nub with my mouth parts, lapping her sweet nectar, an intoxicating taste that deepened my frenzy. I wanted to savor the moment, but I could wait no longer.

When I penetrated her, she quivered and trembled. The lips of her orifice clamped and sucked my stiff rod, beckoning me deep. In and out I thrust. When I pulled out, the bulbous head of my propagator teased her sensitive lips. At its deepest, my stiff rod probed her depths, and my belly stimulated her nub. The musky nectar of her lips coated my abdomen. My seed sac hung heavy beneath my throbbing propagator, begging for release. Each plunge was a gentle caress, a desperate act, a delirious dance.

At last, my eyes and muscles clenched, and a primitive scream escaped the core of my being. My stiff rod convulsed and spasmed. With thrust after thrust, I flooded her with jets of my seed, squirting deep into her egg vault, fertilizing her, making her children mine. I kept pumping until white globs of seed dribbled at my feet.

I withdrew. With my antennae still swimming in her pheromones, my propagator remained stiff as stone. Yet I took the time to savor a delicious sight--the lips of her satisfied orifice closing around my seed, drawing it deep into her channel. Even now, the eggs within her vault were quickening to life.

I would father the next generation.

Many orifices remained. I found them, penetrated them, took them, pumped my seed into them, one after the other. In my frenzy, no power could stop me until I had shot my seed into every orifice and fertilized every egg.

* * * * *

Reve had passed. The Queen's pheromones had dissipated long ago, and with it, any delusion of love.

I once wondered if there was a difference between love and thinking I was in love. I know the difference now. I never felt love. Lust was what I felt. A pheromone-induced lustful frenzy, a product of my genetic programming, designed to ensure the hive's survival. A chemical reaction, nothing more.

The queen didn't care about me. I had been a fool.

My hair grew back colorless and white. I asked blessers what my role was, now that I had fertilized the Queen, but they lacked the wisdom to answer. There was no new role for me. I was too small to help workers excavate. Without an exoskeleton or wings, I could not help hunters collect food. Tenders didn't need an aging breeder in the way while they served the Queen.

Everyone, it seemed, had a role to play to prepare for a new generation. Everyone but me.

In time, the Queen gave birth. Larvae--thousands of them, white and tiny as glowstones, their caste undetermined. Tenders carried them to the nursery chambers. There, they swam in cells of embryonic fluid, feeding on nutrients and hydrocarbons. When they had fattened and filled their cells, they metamorphosed. Genetic chemistry reconfigured their larval bodies into molecular goo. They were changing, determining their final form, their caste, their role in the colony.

After they hatched, they filled the tunnels, mature adults, taking their place in the hive. Large workers, ready to excavate tunnels and gather food. Hunters with exoskeletons to protect them from radiation, ready to spread their wings. Blessers, their black hair already grown into distinctive whorls. Golden-furred tenders, anxious to serve the queen. And even a new batch of breeders--their number twice that of my generation. Our hive was strong.

Time passed. With little else to do, and not wanting to be in the way, I found myself exploring unused parts of the hive. I wandered through tunnels that had been excavated long ago and abandoned. I found chambers where I spent my time in silent contemplation. Some were small and thick with crystals of silicon. Others so majestic that I could entertain myself with the echoes of my chittering.

Here, in the forgotten corners of the hive, this would be a suitable place for an old breeder to wait to die.

But I was not alone. I heard the sounds of footsteps approaching. And in the chamber entrance, there stood a tender.

Then I recognized it--her.

Her hair had grayed, and her antennae sagged, but this was the tender that had strapped an extra blade to my ankle.

"There you are." She entered and rested her abdomen beside mine. "I've been following your pheromones everywhere. What are you doing so far from the rest of the colony?"

"Waiting." I let out a breath of nitrogen and methane. "That's what breeders do. We wait."

"Come with me. I have a better place to wait than this old cavern."

She took my hand and led me through the tunnels, navigating junctions and branches with ease. One was particularly dark. As she led me deeper, a soft glow appeared ahead. It ended in a chamber at the base of a vent chimney.

She had brought me here before. This was where she had given me her excretion hole. But the chamber had changed. The floor was polished smooth. Jars and bowls sat on neat shelves carved into the rock walls. Clean yellow robes hung from hooks. A crystal chime, stirred by currents of nitrogen, played soft music.

"I think of it as my Queen chamber." She ignited glowstones in the walls with a touch. Their cyan fire, combined with light from the magenta sky, illuminated the chamber in a bluish glow.

"You live here?"

"Well." She approached me, and I looked up into her moist eyes. "I was hoping we could live here."

My mouth parts opened, but no words came out. When Reve came, the Queen was all I could think about. When Reve ended, still I did not think of this tender. Surely she must feel disrespected. How could she want me to live with her?

"All my life, I've felt like a queen trapped in a tender's body." She touched another glowstone, and it flickered to life. "Other tenders laughed when I told them. Blessers had no answers. I even told the Queen. She never speaks." The tender shrugged. "But you--only you have treated me as a female. That's why I love you."

She took my hand and we sat together on a cushioned bench. "I know you're a breeder. That's why you didn't seek me out after Reve. I don't blame you. It wasn't your purpose. Besides, I was busy seeing to the Queen..." She looked away, her mouth parts clamped tight.

Then she turned back, cyan light reflected in her deep eyes. "But all that is over now. A new generation runs the hive. We're no longer constrained by the roles of our caste. We can do anything we want."

She stroked the fur around the base of my antennae. "Do you remember that thing we did before?"

I nodded. How could I forget? She took me here and gave me her excretion hole--a foretaste of the Queen, of my purpose in the hive.

"Well... Nothing has ever made me feel so feminine." Her hand traced a line along my thorax, down the robe that covered my abdomen, until it came to rest between my legs.

"But I'm old now. And it's not Reve." I didn't need to explain this. Through my robe, she was touching my propagator, soft and limp.

"I think we can fix that." She reached above us and retrieved an amphora from a shelf. She broke the wax seal.

My antennae twitched, sampling the scent, dank and musty.

That aroma! That wonderful heady aroma, dancing on currents of methane and nitrogen. My propagator swelled, pushing my robe aside. Veins pulsed in tangled knots around my thick shaft. She gripped it and stroked from the tip to the base, again and again. Her mouth parts drooled polymers of saliva, and her hand slid up and down the length of my hard rod. Obscene slapping sounds echoed in the vent chimney overhead.