Chapter 4

"Yes, I know it's all chaos. Give me an audience." A dancer actively blocked V-Naia's path, determined to follow protocol in time of war. She hovered, brilliantly red in the morning sun. At her left, her second lieutenant gleamed copper, and at her right golden G-Siol hovered. Together they were a sunset at the Sunset Cycad.

"Tell me again why..."

"We have a proposal for M-Nev's eyes only. An audience, please!"

"I can't let you by unless I know why."

"Just let us the hell through," huffed G-Siol, flying forward, posturing. The dancer, undaunted, moved to block the sentry.

"G-Siol," V-Naia warned for the dancer's benefit. "Look, dancer, this is important. We would not be requesting audience with M-Nev if it were not."

"V-Naia, is it, of the Pool Fed by Falling Water?" M-Nev, who had been issuing orders nearby, inserted herself between the dancer and the sentries.

"Southern Fern-Shaded, Elder M-Nev," replied V-Naia, dropping altitude in deference to her Commander. A-Pol and G-Siol followed suit.

"Of course. F-Enek, you may go. Fly with me, all of you." The Elder Sentry was a robust female, impossible to ignore. Her exoskeleton was a deep green, striped in dusky orange and etched with evidence of a thousand battles. They had been as sand carried on the wind, and she a desert stone.

"My squadron is downed with two injured, or we'd still be fighting. Elder M-Nev, the Gomphid are too many. Too many for a dying two pool tribe."

"It is true." M-Nev wheeled through the air, motions erratic with Flight Language and travel. She kept the focus of her great green jewel-faceted eyes on the ballet chatter of the dancers around the Cycad. "Most of our reserves are committed to the defense of our lines. We suspect that the Gomphid have bolstered their own force with hunter recruits."

"That would not explain the numbers, not completely." V-Naia shot ahead of her Commander, leaping in Flight before settling onto a leaf of the Cycad and fading into the wing twitching of Alighted. M-Nev joined her, choosing an adjacent leaf. G-Siol and A-Pol remained aloft.

"Other castes too, then, none of them learned in battle but determined enough to fight." M-Nev's shining lenses met those of V-Naia, whose deep red eyes followed the complex wing motion. "What is your proposal?"

"G-Siol suggest we go around."

"Go around what?"

"The border. We go to Gomphid skies and find a weakness," G-Siol explained, fiddling with his spear, slightly unnerved in the presence of the Elder.

"A reconnaissance mission. We've sent scouts, G-Siol. They have not returned. What makes you think you would succeed where they have failed?"

"We are Blindsiders, Elder," interjected A-Pol, as though that explained everything. He kept his own spear at ease.

"That we are, that we are!" P-Ten darted into the field of view, flying with an enthusiasm that belied her recent injury. Clearly she had had a refreshing rest. Subdued F-Ness followed her closely for the sake of caution and under the orders of a healer.

"Do you even know what they're talking about?" demanded F-Ness, her amber-gilded amethyst a blur keeping up with her bright fuchsia charge.

"Well, no, but I assume they'll fill us in." P-Ten managed to stop before colliding with A-Pol, though it was probable she'd cut things close on purpose.

"P-Ten! Good to see you flying again," V-Naia greeted her first lieutenant.

"Yes, good," managed a slightly vexed A-Pol. "What of N-Centh?"

"She will live, but she may be in pain for the better part of a long cycle, the healer thinks," answered F-Ness, flying in a shallow mutter. "C-Epon is with her. We have moved her from the east magnolia wood to poolside. She is resting."

"But will she fly?" V-Naia needed confirmation. She'd had high hopes for the youthful officer, and did not like to see them dashed.

"Yes, she will fly, but not with us. Not soon."

"So we fly at six."

"No, you will fly at seven," M-Nev interjected. "You will take on the mission you've proposed, and you will have full rank."

"What is the mission? Will somebody tell me?" P-Ten leapt, performed a frustrated barrel roll and concluded by violating G-Siol's personal airspace.

He reflexively backed away, and repeated, "We go around."

"We're taking on a reconnaissance mission, infiltrating Gomphid skies," explained V-Naia. "But, Elder, tell me how you wish us to fill our ranks?"

"Wait a few beats. You'll see soon enough.

Chapter 3

The first lieutenant dove from above at an otherwise distracted Gomphid squadron. She cut through the seven-member V-formation and grabbed one member on her way down, fracturing the enemy team into three parts. P-Ten and the Gomphid fell, twirling and lashing at each other with their spears, into the grasses and ferns below.

"P-Ten! Fewmets!" V-Naia tried to focus on her remaining squadron. They were nearing the end of the third short cycle, and after three dawns and dusks, they were making mistakes. P-Ten, for instance, was more reckless than usual. At least it seemed as though she'd taken out the rival captain.

"Before they come together, A-Pol, lead against the four! N-Centh," she signaled her youngest officer, "we'll take the other two."

The second lieutenant split his group of four in two, joining one of the pairs. The pairs wove back and forth in a figure-eight pattern toward the four Gomphid. One Gomphid, weary or inexperienced or both, fell into the trap, attacking an officer only to find herself at the end of A-Pol's spear. A Gomphid lieutenant quickly responded, calling for his two strays to rejoin the squadron.

"Don't let them go," warned V-Naia, as she and N-Centh attacked their marks. Just as she said this, her opponent seized the moment and answered his lieutenant's call. "Keep on yours!" V-Naia yelled to her officer as she sped after the enemy.

She overshot her opponent. Perhaps she misjudged her own speed, or perhaps the Gomphid simply slowed, but either way it was a tactical error. Trying to correct this, V-Naia decreased her velocity, and quickly found herself in a mid-air vertical roll, opposite an enemy doing the same thing. V-Naia attempted to block his spear with her own, all the while mimicking his speed, but they were evenly matched and approaching the primary skirmish.

"On alert!" A-Pol ordered his three, who dove out of the way, as did the three Gomphid. C-Epon, the first officer, then dove back in the way, timing it well and picking off V-Naia's Gomphid as they tumbled by.

V-Naia managed to right herself and return to her squadron. The remaining Gomphid had retreated to recover their wounded. "Wuff. Nice work. What are our numbers?"

"P-Ten is down," A-Pol reported, "and three Gomphid. Where's N-Centh?"

N-Centh, no match for the more experienced (not to mention bigger) Gomphid officer, had fallen. V-Naia did not know where that fight had ended, but she did know where it had started. "A-Pol, go after P-Ten. I'll find N-Centh. F-Ness?" she signaled her third officer. "Come with me."

--

A sparse wood of sweet magnolia preceded the eastern borderland of Epepreo territory. It spanned almost as far as the northern border, but petered out in the south, giving way to the vespin hive field V-Naia and her Blindsiders had been defending. The canopy of this wood was usually thick for all the individual trees kept their distance, but at the moment many limbs were stripped of choice twigs and leaves, and the last sunlight of the third short cycle shown through it.

A sentry lay upon a leaf on the floor of this wood. His wings were crumpled beyond repair. His legs curled stiffly inward and hemolymph had pooled and long since congealed beneath him. His formerly emerald exoskeleton already seemed dusty, even in the dying light.

V-Naia tried to ignore it, choosing to focus on her own sentries. P-Ten and N-Centh clung steadfastly to life, though they remained unconscious. A-Pol had flown after a healer, and the rest of the Blindsiders huddled around their fallen, among endless rows of casualties on leaves.

--

The red moon, in waxing crescent, had risen above the treetops before A-Pol returned with a healer. P-Ten perched limply upright on her leaf, asleep but stable. N-Centh, her left hind leg twisted strangely, lay without comfort on her side, her wings askew. It was her the healer tended to first.

"Sentry," said the healer to her in subdued Alighted. N-Centh, now awake but groggy, barely noticed. "Here. Chew this." The healer offered a small bit of odd vegetable matter, and the officer took it in her mandibles. Its juices flowed through her and she soon slept again.

V-Naia watched over P-Ten, and kept an eye on N-Centh with her peripheral vision. A-Pol held N-Centh's leg straight as the healer carefully applied a poultice. The rest of the squadron just watched. A sentry's knowledge of field medicine was minimal at best, consisting primarily of stabilization and transport techniques.

--

Not long after the healer had left for other fallen, the night lepido emerged from their arboreal nooks. They were sparrow-sized shadows on wide graceful wings, and they spiraled from one flower to the next, navigating the blossoms with long feathered antennae and sipping nectar with longer unfurled tongues.

They were easy prey.

Five Blindsiders sat by their fallen comrades, munching their midnight meals. "This is futile, isn't it?" V-Naia's wings twitched as her mandibles cut through an unfortunate lepido's thorax. "We can't win this way."

"It's not over yet, Captain," replied A-Pol, also chewing.

"It will be over soon if something doesn't change."

"We're one squadron. One downed squadron. What are you suggesting we do?" asked F-Ness, the third officer.

"We go around, that's what we do," suggested G-Siol, the second officer.

V-Naia rose on her tarsi, setting the remains of her lepido in front of her. "That's good. That's what we do. But around what, G-Siol?"

"The front, the border. Into Gomphid skies. We go around and find a weakness."

"And if there isn't one?"

"There's always a blind spot, V-Naia. Isn't that what we train to find?"

"He has a point," chimed in A-Pol, finishing his dinner.

"Hmm. So he does. We may go around the line, but we will do this by the lore. G-Siol, A-Pol, come with me to Council at first sun."

Chapter 2

P-Ten clung fast with four tarsi to the back of a desperately bucking chiron. Her fore and mid-right limbs were devoted to thrusting a spear at the neck of the creature. V-Naia kept an eye on her first lieutenant as she, the captain, faced radar ears, great nearly blind eyes and razor-sharp canines. The chiron screeched, lunging at her, but she feinted, knocking it on the side of its skull with her weapon. Twice as big, and at least four times as massive as the Aeshnida, the chiron were potentially formidable predators. Luckily, they were also loners and predictable, hunting primarily at dusk. They flew on cumbersome membranous wings, and they could generally be outmaneuvered by a standard seven-member squadron.

This particular chiron dodged to the left, into the spear of a flanking officer. It pulled right again reflexively, and into the spear point that gave the formation symmetry. The officer on the behind that spear stumbled backwards, absorbing the force of the chiron and turning to fight gravity. The second lieutenant, who covered the back of the formation, noted that it was time to finish the skirmish. "Take it down," he signaled to the two officers waiting above, and P-Ten, who still stuck to the back of the chiron. A-Pol, the second lieutenant, dove after the dazed right flanker as the rest of the squadron chased the creature into the lush grasses and ferns below.

"Good work," V-Naia approved, allowing P-Ten to take the finishing stab and the first morsel. "By the lore." The rest of the squadron followed P-Ten's lead, taking bits of meat from the muscular area just behind the chiron's wings. These they would carry impaled on spear point to those of the tribe who could not hunt for themselves. The rest they left to the dipter and other scavengers, a signal to other chiron that the northern borders of Epepreo land were not safe.

Just as V-Naia took the seventh morsel, a flash of yellow and deep brown appeared over head. "Who goes?" demanded copper-tinged A-Pol.

"M-Bene of the Epepreo, Southern Fern-Shaded Pool," the dancer replied with her learned flourish. "M-Nev bids your squadron meet at the Sunset Cycad. It is a Gathering. Make haste!"

She did not stay for conversation, flying off instead to find the next nearest sentries on chiron patrol, looking not unlike a vespin with the bands of alternating color along her abdomen.

--

B-Leon, another dancer, navigated the southeast vespin hive field. A dry night breeze rustled through the thick, tall grasses, and the ruby male was a bundle of nerves. So close to the border, he fretted to himself. Most keepers and sentries had been evacuated from this area already, leaving a skeleton crew to patrol in the temporary calm before more strategic security could be devised. But B-Leon had two more individuals to locate before he could call his assignment complete. "Have you seen M-Ela and Z-Geph?" he called out to a distant keeper.

"Sunward a few beats," the keeper replied.

"Thank you!" B-Leon took a sharp turn westerly, and soon realized how he'd missed the pair. Z-Geph, a pale yellow keeper and M-Ela, a dull orange hunter, were deep in conversation amongst a thick swarm of vespin returning to hive for the night.

"Where have you been?" B-Leon asked, flying headlong into the swarm and dispersing confused vespin left and right.

"Would you be careful? How'd a klutz like you get to be a dancer, of all things?" retorted the hunter.

"Stop. He's just excited," Z-Geph admonished. "I was just relinquishing a weak one for feed," she explained to the dancer. As if to confirm this, she corralled a lone vespin that tumbled through the air. B-Leon's charge had apparently been its last straw.

"I see," answered the dancer. He let the other male put the vespin out of its misery before passing along his message. "What I am here to say," he gathered himself, "is that the Elder Council bids you meet at the Sunset Cycad. It is a gathering, and you're late, so hurry!"

--

Its base was a brilliant reddish-orange, inside and out, and this vivid color extended to the its male cone. Its leaves were black at their tips and lightened in an irregular gradient as they broadened nearer the center and ground. The effect was indeed that of a sun sinking into the horizon, and that the Sunset Cycad was rooted deeply in a steep western hill was probably just coincidence. The Elder Council perched staid on its crown of leaves, and a flock of dancers hovered around them, waiting to remember history. One stranger, red and brown, hung poised above the cone. All around the rise, in innumerable restless strata, were Epepreo of all castes.

Satisfied that quorum had been reached, M-Nev, the Elder Sentry, rose from her perch. The bright twin moons illuminated her striped orange and green form in spite of the new night. "The Gomphid have sent to us, in their Elder Sentry's stead, a herald. C-Fas," she turned to him, "you have the honor of the message."

C-Fas obediently rose so that all could see him. "In the name of S-Fon, Elder Sentry of the Pool of the Gingko, and in the name of my people, I C-Fas of the Double Moon Pool declare war upon you the Epepreo who have but cannot spare the stuff of life."

"Will there be parley?" questioned M-Nev.

"The time is past. There will be no parley," replied C-Fas.

"No parley," repeated the Elder, for the benefit of those gathered. "Then we take you into custody, first prisoner of war C-Fas." She signaled in Tribal to a pair of nearby sentries, who approached the Gomphid in the center of the cycad. "Take him to the west magnolia grove and keep him there. Treat him well." The sentries did as they were told, flanking the dancer and escorting him to a distant cluster of red-leaved trees full of fragrant white flowers.

When C-Fas was out of sight, M-Nev continued her duties as Commander in Chief, sending perhaps half of her sentries to the battle lines, and to the vespin hive fields as security detail. She kept a reserve force in the vicinity of her pools. The other Elders distributed their respective castes accordingly. R-Tem sent many of her hunters to the borderlands to watch for chiron and other creatures who would take advantage of war if they could. F-Uan sent contingents of his keepers to aid in protecting their vespin. A-Sclep and H-Mes assigned certain healers and dancers to accompany the sentries, to act as field medics and heralds and historians respectively. V-Sta kept her nurturers at home.

Almost as an afterthought, M-Nev summoned an unassigned dancer forward. "M-Bene of the Southern Fern-Shaded Pool," she asked, "are you willing to go in trade to the Gomphid, to confirm Epepreo acceptance of war and no parley?"

M-Bene hesitated, thinking of her pool and her people. "I am willing," she finally replied.

"Go then, M-Bene, and Fate be with you."

"Fate be with us all." M-Bene sped off into the east, in the direction of the sentry force, the battle lines and the Gomphid.

"Indeed. Fate be with us at sunrise."