Hirsu's Mission

A train left from Gwal'Lebad for a day's journey to the furthest part of Erebuk, with many anxious passengers onboard. One in particular was using the train as a means to escape what he had done. He stared out the window of the train to look back at the life he left behind; the war-torn forest that was taken over by a viscous, gluttonous enemy he wouldn't know how to combat no matter how many paralytic stingers he shot out.

He was Hirsu Polvero, a top Glaphyr Dorcasom lieutenant, who was leaving his hive behind. He couldn't go back home to his colony, not when he took part in a mission that was responsible for the destruction of every race on Sokondro. However, he couldn't relax his chitinous body, not when he was certain that emissaries were sent to dispose of him for his treason. He remembered how it all went wrong.

He was a young hatchling that was destined to help feed the hive. That all changed when the Glaphyr queens of all of Sokondro united with the other types of Dorcasom: the bulky Necydalians, the spiritualistic Lucanids, and the nocturnal Lepturobans. They united under the name of the Holometa Hive, and waged war against the underwater civilization of their world: the Chemibrion Empire.

The Chemibrion Empire consisted of two amphibious races: the proud warrior manta eel race of Narkelegens, and the scientist salamander-like race of Pleurodan. They both served the Oligarchy of Chemibrion, which consisted of intelligent, jellyfish-like beings from the stars who helped enlighten the Narkelegens to their psionic connection to the planet's metals and gave the Pleurodan their knowledge and technology to aid in their empire's growth. Everything changed when the Holometa Hive issued a Lepturoban assault on a Pleurodan Research and Development facility on the island of Heraclon, killing many Pleurodans and Gastrictus Chemibrion, who came to oversee progress on the facility. That was the day the bloody Holometa-Chemibrion War began.

Both sides felt threatened by each other, and yet had their reasons to partake in this battle. The Glaphyr were watching out for their hives; the Lucanids valued their rainforest homes; the Necydalia defended their territories and young; and the Lepturobans only cared about their survival. The Holometa Hive queens felt threatened by the Oligarchs that seemed to have come from the heavens to enlighten the amphibious races of the Narkelegens and the Pleurodans with their knowledge and technology. The Chemibrion Empire felt paranoiad from the insectoid surface-dwellers polluting and compromising the natural integrity of the oceans, and stealing their wealth of metal and technology.

Hirsu was sent to train with many Glaphyr workers that were converted into soldiers for the Hive. For years, he had learned how to weaponize his paralytic stingers like bullets. This was to aid in helping the Lepturobans and Lucanids get the jump on the enemy with their guerrilla tactics, and Necydalians who were able to bulldoze their way through enemies with their rolling abilities.

The day came when a squad consisting of him, a Necydalian captain named Gasoma Ceton, many Glaphyr, and a few Lepturobans went to target a Chemibrion Research and Development facility within the land of Araven. They were briefed about the Pleurodans and a rogue Glaphyr scientist named Val Zadra making a biological weapon codenamed Project Morphan, named after the eldest Chemibrion, at the behest of the remaining 6 Oligarchs who were enraged by the loss of Gastrictus at the start of the war and then Explosmuto during the Great Battle of Ecdysaedia. They were sent there to kill the traitor and then retrieve the weapon.

They were met with opposition from the Narkelegens along the way that used their psionic powers to repel attacks that were aimed at them. It was an intense battle to get further into the facility, but some were able to get past the enemy, but at a great cost to many comrades that Hirsu knew and cared about.

Hirsu was in horror at seeing the weapon when he went on ahead with Gasoma Ceton and some Lepturobans. They all saw the biological weapon, which was a tube containing a fetus of a ghost-white being that had an antenna sticking out of its head and small purple pustules on its shoulders. Most of the Pleurodans were already dead by a poison they had ingested, but he saw a different face who died with his head hooked up to the fetus by a headset: Morphan Chemibrion himself.

With the Pleurodans and an Oligarch already dead, Gasoma cornered a Pleurodan named Bullcius Amphine. Hirsu spat a honey-like substance to make into handcuffs for the traitorous Val Zadra. Gasoma then went up to Bullcius, and yelled, "Start talking, water lizard. What is this weapon?" Bullcius coughed some blood before he croaked out, "The Empire's perfect revenge against your Hive." He died moments later the same way his comrades had died.

Hirsu was taking Val Zadra out of the room when Gasoma called out, "What are you doing, Lieutenant Polvero? Leave the traitor to the Lepturobans. Help me load this weapon if that croaker believes this could threaten the queens." Polvero felt conflicted because he knew that High Queen Holometa and the other Hive Queens were to be protected against attempts on their lives, but he had a terrible feeling that if this weapon were in their hands, the Hive would be no better than the Empire that they feared.

He didn't have time to ponder further when Val Zadra yelled out, "Orkudra, forgive me!" Val Zadra then threw his body at the tube, which released the fetus within and the fluids that contained it, knocking down Gasoma and forcing Hirsu to fly up to avoid the liquids. The creature swallowed Zadra up in its slimy embrace and grew quickly into a ghost-white mudskipper-like creature with purple bulbous pustules on the shoulders that swallowed up the dead bodies all around it by becoming liquid-like, before proceeding to target Gasoma. Hirsu ran away from the monster that was let loose at the facility to swallow up everything around it that was organic.

It didn't take long before the creature, dubbed the Morphian, capable of swallowing and mimicking anything it swallowed, had birthed more of itself from all that it swallowed. Dorcasom, Narkelegen, Pleurodan, plant, wildlife, anything organic that would ensure its own survival and that of its offspring.

Hirsu took the opportunity to journey to a train that was evacuating Dorcasom citizens from the nearest town of Gwal'Lebad that was nearby the infestation of the Morphians. He had to escape like many others who were afraid of being swallowed up by the plague of viscous monsters that ate the forces of the Empire and the Hive. He heard many clicks from passengers that were afraid of how the Morphians ate through a whole hive of Glaphyr and took out their Queen, Cinella Psyllo.

He didn't want to hear any more about the Morphians and went to a dining car to eat his life away in the Glaphyr nectar, pollen, and kidney apple stew. However, some of the Lepturoban passengers in the dining car looked at this wallowing Glaphyr. Two of them got up towards Hirsu, spooking him awake with a flash bomb they spat out, but he evaded their blades quickly, albeit he stumbled back which led to his shoulder wound.

One of them spoke, "It's not too often we have to halt feasting on the Lunaga meat, Naraka, but Orkudra has smiled upon us by giving us the one who turned traitor." The other one, Konazard Naraka, spoke, "The High Queen will want his head, but she never said in what condition, Gredden."