Iron Nest (War for New Terra, Book 2) by T.W.M. Ashford

Author:T.W.M. Ashford [Ashford, T.W.M.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2022-04-25T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Ten

The queen latched onto the side of the mining platform with a pair of giant bristly claws. Others, further down her body, dug into the stone walls like climbing hooks. The whole cavern shook with her weight.

She dwarfed even the largest units amongst her roach army. Ginger reckoned she was easily twice the size of a tank bug, maybe even double one of those flying bombers. It was hard to put things in perspective, really, what with a single insect occupying every inch of her vision.

The queen’s body consisted of three segments like a wasp – a head, abdomen and thorax – with similar proportions for each. Her abdomen hung far below the edge of the platform. Glancing down, Ginger spotted no stinger. Instead, she suspected the bulbous mass hanging beneath her housed dozens, maybe hundreds of roach eggs – they were the breed of bug the queen herself most resembled, after all.

The thorax – that is, the insect’s midriff – was almost entirely protected by a shell of off-white chitin armour. And not just that. Patches of the same purple and yellow gunk they’d seen plastered across the factory doors reinforced her particularly vulnerable spots, too. Man, they’d thought the tank bugs were tough to kill. Compared to this monster, they were nothing but woodlice under a hardback book.

And then came the head. Christ almighty, the head. A pair of serrated mandibles the size of drop ship wings flanked a series of vertical slits through which smaller bugs scuttled in and out. Food carriers, Ginger guessed. Unlike the roaches, however, which only had the two eyes – small and forward facing, more like those of an apex predator than the compound eyes of a normal insect – the queen boasted a whopping six pairs, starting largest at the front and running in twin curves towards the back of her head which, of course, was as armour-plated as her middle.

“Sod it,” Evans spluttered, raising his rifle. “If I’m dying down here, I’m taking that bitch with me.”

“Hold your fire.” Ginger smacked his gun back down. “The roaches aren’t coming any further. I want to know why.”

“You sure they just don’t want to infringe on their boss’s feeding time?” Ghost said, frantically switching her aim from one target to the other.

“Yeah, I’m with Ghost.” Duke looked as if he’d stepped out of a shower, he was sweating so hard. “Queenie thinks we’re a goddamn snack.”

“Maybe.” Ginger tried to keep from trembling. “But then, why hasn’t she eaten us yet? And if she hasn’t,” she added, quickly glancing at the impatient roaches behind them, “why haven’t they?”

Because I will not let them.

Ginger dropped to her knees and clutched at her head. It felt like it was swelling inside her helmet… like her brain was a bowl of popcorn turning in a microwave oven. The rest of her fireteam collapsed in much the same way. She guessed she didn’t need to ask them whether they’d heard the voice, too.

“Heard” wasn’t quite right, though.

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