maybeElse

116.678 wakes in the back of a van, hivedreams slowly receding as its lonelyself comes back to the surface. It hurts as it always does, but its two service dolls are fussing around it, and there's the familiar fullness of fresh tanks slotting into its back, so it's okay.

It's fine.

It hurts, but there's the warm reassurance of hivethoughts lapping at its most distant thoughts, the reassuring hum and flicker all through the wires that grow like lichen across the van's surface, the feeling of its dolls easing it back into the world.

And there's the purpose filling the depths of 116.678's mind, the reassurance of being its aloneself for a Reason. Nothing like it was before—

One of its dolls helps it to its feet as the other opens the door, and it slips out onto the street.

For a moment 116.678 is unsteady, almost falling; for a moment its dolls reach out from the van to brace it, their long power cables stretching out behind them—

And then it remembers. The knowledge flows back into its mind just like it never left, as perhaps it never did.

It twirls, spinning on the balls of its feet, feeling the weight of the full tanks on its back, feeling the way they change its movements; it's all so familiar! This is what it's For.

But it still takes a moment to let its dolls kiss its visor for good luck, to thank them. It's the little things that make the bigger ones flow smoothly, and it can't imagine waking up without them.

(Once, long ago, the hive let its drones wake up within itself, surrounded by their fellows. Once it didn't realize how distressing that would be.)

116.678 takes a moment to orient itself as its dolls slide the door closed, as the sound of a teakettle whistling filters out through a half-opened window; it looks up into the darkened sky, at the bright lights of beachfront clubs, at the bodies piled in a bar's doors—

Ah.

That's why it's here.

It takes a moment to check its filters (not that it doubts its dolls! but it has to), to stretch, and then it steps over them into smoky darkness.

It's quiet inside the bar, music cut along with the lights. Exit signs shed trace light, but 116.678 is glad that it doesn't need to rely on them to see. There are more bodies, not all insensate: whatever's in the smoke has gifted its victims with lusty nightmares, priapistic delirium, a chorus of painful groans and whimpering moans. 116.678 does its best to ignore them: it's never been good with understanding stuff like that. It can't wait to be back in the hivedream, where everything makes sense, where it can feel the minds around it as easily as its own …

It checks behind the bar, finds fallen mannequins and a foam-mouthed witch: a bad reaction, it supposes. It takes a moment to hope that she'll recover before continuing on.

The booths and barstools and pooltables are much of the same, fallen bodies and lost minds. It's a disaster, truly, but far from the worst that 116.678 has seen; if it walks its purpose as well as its hive knows it will then this will all fade with little lasting harm and a minimum of necromancy. Hell, the building is still standing! That puts it far above the last time 116.678 had to wake into the world.

But there's nothing out here to interest it.

Nothing for it to make safe.

So 116.678 continues on, picking its way through sticky stains and fallen beerbottles and shattered glass, through all the detritus of a place which is suddenly Not Safe For Habitation, across bodies both spasming insensate and tragically still—

Until it finally hears a noise from the restroom, from that flippantly-labeled door buried in a back corner right by an overladen bus cart and a too-full trash can; a slight hiccuping sob echoing off ceramic bowls and tiled floors, a noise so faint that it would never have heard it if the music was still going, if people were talking, if the bar was buzzing with life—

But it does hear.

The restroom door creaks as 116.678 pushes it open; a cloud of organic toxins rolls out (its filters throw up a helpful tooltip to explain exactly what they are, but don't offer any hint about what effect direct exposure would have on 116.678's modified anatomy) and the sob silences itself, held back behind palms pressed to lips and eyes spread wide with fear—

Phlegmy mirrors hang above decaying sinks, grudgingly reflecting a row of stalls (and nothing that's not equally there outside the reflection—116.678 takes its time making sure of that). All but one are open, and behind that one thin door it can sense the faint warmth of the thing it's here to make safe.

116.678 knocks on the stall door, two quick taps echoing through the silence, reverberating off tiles and glass and porcelain for just long enough to elicit a startled gasp from inside.

It waits, but no other reply comes.

With a sigh 116.678 lowers itself to the ground across from the stall, leans its protruding tanks against the pipes curling beneath the nearest sink, stretches its legs out; a posture that couldn't be further from a threat, an angle that lets it see just far enough through the crack beneath the stall door to know that the creature inside has pulled their legs up against their chest, that they're perched in a trembling bundle atop the toilet's lidded seat. That they know it's there.

(116.678 also sees that the floor is filthy. Its shiny skin will need to be cleaned afterwards, to wash off any lingering poisons, but sitting down has definitely given its dolls quite a bit of additional work. It's sure that they'll be happy about that: they do so love to be of use.)

It waits …

… and waits …

… but not for very long.

It's barely been a minute when the door opens just a crack, just enough for a big green eye framed by mottled orange scales to peek through, to stare at 116.678. It waves, a tiny hand motion that sends the door slamming back shut as the thing inside panics, but it's a start.

“Hey,” 116.678 says. “Is your stomach okay?”

It can practically taste the confusion emanating from behind the door. “Yes?” the thing inside finally answers, “why wouldn't it be?”

“You've been in a filthy restroom stall for hours. This unit thought it would be polite to ask.”

They laugh, startled, caught off guard—it's clearly not what they were expecting. “What, no! That's not why I'm in here.”

116.678 grins to itself, insomuch as a drone can grin. “Oh! Is it because of the aerosolized neurotoxins soaking the bar?”

“… yes. What? Yes. Why are you even asking.”

“This unit supposed that making you laugh would be an easier start to the conversation we're about to have.”

“… oh.”

“Please do say if it wasn't. This unit always wants to improve.”

They sigh and crack the door open again, peering at 116.678 from their perch. “No, that … it got me out of my head for a moment. So that was nice.”

“This unit is glad. But … we should move things along. Rescue teams won't be able to come in until, well,” it waves its hand vaguely, “even with some weatherworkers around to help dissipate it.”

“Oh. I was wondering why no one had …”

116.678 shrugs. “Taking things slow is standard for stuff like this. Maybe someday it won't be.”

“But, still … they've been inhaling that stuff for, god, no, that can't be good. What if some of them are dead? What if I've killed them?!”

“That's what necromancers are for, right?”

“… but, that's still … resurrections change people.”

“Sometimes! This unit wouldn't know; its hive has better options. But it must ask, if you didn't want this to happen then why did you …?”

The creature in the stall doesn't bother to close the door as it sobs into its knees. It's answer is full of despair. “I didn't mean to! I just, there were so many people, and one of them tried talking to me, and, and …”

“You panicked?”

“… yeah.” They curl more tightly in on themself; the stall door swings open just enough to let 116.678 see their red-tipped tail wrapped around the toilet's pipe, keeping them steady as they shake. “And I'm not that good at stopping it yet. It just sort of … keeps on going.”

“And then you ran and hid in here, and it seeped out into the rest of the bar?”

“Yeah, I think, I … stuff always gets hazy around when I …”

116.678 nods, leans forward just a notch. “And you haven't been able to stop it yet?”

“… no.”

“Okay. So … oh! This unit has forgotten to introduce itself; it is 116.678, one of its hive's conversion drones. May it ask your name?”

“Oh, yeah. I'm ██████ … does it really matter?”

“This unit finds that it usually does. But that brings us to the point, ██████: you're not able to control your toxins enough to actually be in public, to be around people. Right?”

██████'s nodding is barely visible with how tightly curled their body is; 116.678's filters pop up a warning about increasing toxin levels.

“So,” it continues, “you could just not. But that would feel awful, right? Being cramped up at home all the time, not even able to go out on walks …”

“That's what I do,” ██████ softly says. “I just thought … I just thought it would be fine. Just the once. Just once in a while.”

“Oh, this unit is so sorry …”

“Yeah, well, what would you know? You've got your hive right there, right? You're never lonely. Never trapped.”

116.678 shakes its head gently, carefully considers what to say. “I do now. This unit did not always. It … there's a reason that it was woken when its hive received the request for assistance.”

██████ uncurls just enough to look at it, to try to stare past its thick latex skin, past the glossy black visor with its friendly blue accents, down into 116.678's heart—they fail, of course. It doesn't have a heart to see, not any more. But it appreciates that they're trying.

“If this unit wasn't properly contained,” 116.678 continues, “it would be just as bad as what's happened here because of you.”

“… oh.”

“So … that's why this unit is here. Its hive appreciates things like it, and things like you: things that aren't safe in their own skin.” It pauses, lets the implication simmer in ██████'s mind for a moment. “So it's here to offer you an invitation to join it, at least for long enough to get you safely back to your home and clean up this mess. Or longer, if you decide you want that.”

From there it's all just negotiation, hashing out the details of an agreement—how long ██████ will be in the hivedream before they're woken, before they get to decide whether to stay; what they're okay with happening and what they're not, which parts of them will remain untouched by the hive's honeyed thoughts.

It doesn't take as long as you might think. 116.678 is good at its job, and ██████ is desperate, hurt, eager to escape from the reality of what they've done.

Then there's the flowing latex, the tanks on 116.678's back disgorging their contents into its stingers and pumps, all those carefully engineered systems that make a field conversion possible, that tuck ██████'s mind away as they fade into the hive, as that buzzing web of thoughts and feelings and sensations opens up to them—

When 116.678 and the new drone finally pick their way out of the bar's front door there already a team of paramedics and necromancers and service dolls sorting the bodies and carrying them out of the bar, all wearing pristine hazmat suits; there's the two dolls waiting by the open van, their bellies full of tea and faces warm with the joy of another successful mission. They all carefully steady the new drone as it gets inside, as its mind settles deeper into the hive and the hive slips into its body—

And then the doors close and 116.678 finally, happily, slips back into its hive's long dreams, back into the dissolving thoughts of all the beings that have come together to become it, back into all their dreams of what the world could become—

And back into the long slow plans of how to make the hive's dreams real.