//Writing Soundtrack - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EpVQwdik2i0

Alert: Biomass threshold reached. Initiating Design Program.

Just as I was suddenly very conscious about me now having a female body, and the implications with the Egg I probably hatched out of, a new prompt popped up. A moment later it was followed up by something not unlike a rendering program I was familiar with. Although I had never learned how to properly use it, I at least knew what it was meant for. And it wasn’t any stretch to realise what this was for.

But again, despite my intellectual revolt against this new development, I didn’t feel particularly bothered with it. It started to really freak me out at this point.

Either way, it seemed it was time for me to design the next body. Not that I had many options. From the interface it was clear that the new body would start as a [Hexclaw Hatchling], not my own Evolution Path of [Antimatter Hexclaw]. On the one hand that kind of sucked, since that meant if this body died I would lose a frankly ridiculous Evolution Path. But on the other hand if every body could evolve on their own that meant I had a much better capability to adapt to whatever I faced. Since I couldn’t really change much about it, apart from the size and details like hair colour and other meaningless things I kind of left it as is. The only thing I did change was the size, putting the slider to as small as possible. If I had to lay this egg I didn’t want to rip myself apart.

Again, I fretted about my utter lack of visceral reaction to any of this. I hadn’t even truly come to terms with my new body yet, pushing that aside and not wanting to deal with it, but now it was too late.

Once I assanted to the design, another prompt popped up, and this one truly shocked me.

Alert: What consciousness will obtain control over [Hexclaw Hatchling]?

NULL / Hive-Mind

What the fuck? Did I have more than one consciousness? I mean it would explain my body doing stuff on its own when I was out of it. Maybe those instincts I thought would take over are actually the other consciousness? If that was the case, what was I to do? On the one hand, part of me would love to have someone to talk to. And maybe that way I can get them out of my own body, since frankly it kind of creeped me out to have them there. Did I override them? Would they be mad at me for taking their body? I mean it’s not like I chose to do that, it just kind of happened. But what if they were hostile? Those instincts were the thing with the most chance to survive, considering I didn’t know diddley about surviving in a hostile world. So they might try to kill me.

And that brought me to the other option, keeping them confined in my own body to have at least marginal control. Although, then the question was, was I truly a Hive-Mind? What if I lost this body if I chose the new one for myself? Then things would be even worse, considering how strong my body was, all things considered.

In the end that was the deciding factor. I much rather take my chances with a hostile hatchling, rather than a hostile [Antimatter Hexclaw]. With dread I selected the Hive-Mind, and immediately felt my body surging.

I felt heavy, weak and sluggish, and I could feel something inside me changing. I had always laughed at the characters in the books I read, don’t be a pussy, just push out the Egg and be done with it. I never understood the existential dread that came from laying an Egg as a man in a woman’s body. To all female beings out there, I sincerely apologise for making fun of your hardships. The moment it began I understood exactly why it was such a traumatic experience and I screamed.

The process went by in kind of a fugue, although I didn’t really lose myself in it. It was just that my mental faculties were busy going into full panic while my body spasmed in pain as I pushed out the Egg. I had no idea how long it would take, but I would be damned to ever do that again.

When I was finally done I was an exhausted mess, too weak to even move my fingers. I was panting like crazy, despite not needing to breathe.

Alert: Consciousness Hive-Mind transferred to [Hexclaw Hatchling].

At least it kind of confirmed my fears, although I could have done without the confirmation. I closed my eyes, trying to calm myself down while I cried myself out, all thoughts of dignity or manhood thoroughly shattered into a thousand pieces and scattered to the winds.

Nothing ever prepares you for this kind of thing, ever. At least not if you’re a man. Although, at this point, I wasn’t even sure I could call myself that anymore. I really wasn’t. And while I mostly thought like one, I had become so different over the one or two days I’ve been here that it didn’t seem to fit anymore.

Eventually I came out of my mental struggle, setting the issues I felt aside for the moment to regain some control of myself. That was when I noticed that I was also somewhere else. Like I was in my body, and my body lay on the ground, but I was also in a dark and wet and warm place. It took me embarrassingly long to realise that despite the fact that I pushed the Hive-Mind into it, I could still feel the new body. Which seemed to not make any sense.

I decided to make that a tomorrow problem. I was far too confused and tired to think about any of that. So, without moving from my spot, I closed my eyes and fell asleep instantly.

My usual dreams were gone, instead when I slept I experienced the world from the perspective of the Hatchling. And what a weird experience that was. I couldn’t feel what it was thinking, outside my own thoughts of course, but I could still feel everything it did.

I don’t know how long my own body was out, but it was long enough for the Hatchling to actually hatch. I shouldn’t have been, but I was surprised when it started to move of its own accord without any input from me. It struggled a lot, and I couldn’t really do much to help it. While I could forcefully wrangle control from it for myself, I knew it would hurt both me and the other consciousness. I didn’t know how I knew, but it seemed weirdly logical for it to be that way.

Eventually it managed to escape the Egg, stumbling out as the Egg collapsed behind it. And it immediately turned around and started eating the Egg. Intellectually I was horrified, but again, it wasn’t a self-reinforcing feeling, just a sudden jolt of “What the Hell are you doing?!” before I settled, accepting what was going on.

It didn’t eat all of it, leaving around half, and then it turned around to look at my sleeping form. Panic overcame me, would it try to hurt me? Just as I started to truly panic for once, like a life or death struggle, trying to collect enough of my faculties to wrangle control from the other consciousness it walked up to my sleeping form, bent down and… picked up the pitiful remains of my hotpants, one by one, neatly putting it next to me, before it turned around and started to gather more dead plants. I was stunned. Relieved, of course, but mainly stunned.

For the rest of my sleep I watched as it collected more and more things, often eating half of it, and bringing the rest to me, laying it all out in neat rows of different things and materials.

And when it was finished it simply sat down next to me, watching me, until I woke up.

Waking up felt weird. I still got all the input from the Hatchling, it simply was added to when my main body woke up. I immediately opened my eyes and jumped away from the Hatchling, guarding myself in my best unarmed fighting stance. Which to be fair wasn’t very good. The Hatchling just watched me, then slowly got up, looked at me, before bowing deeply.

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

“Prime”, it said, in a voice eerily similar to my own.

I looked at it, stunned once more. After a moment I recovered enough to speak. “Prime?”, I asked, a little dumbfounded.

The Hatchling straightened, then nodded. It looked as if it was a new motion for it, testing it. “Yes. You are the Prime.”, it said, as if that explained everything. Well, it kind of did, but also left open a multitude of questions I couldn’t even begin to sort through.

Another few moments went by while I tried to settle all the different thoughts currently racing through my head. Finally, when I felt like I had at least marginal control of my mental faculties, I spoke once more.

“If I’m the Prime, what are you?”, I asked, still on guard.

“We are the multitude. We are the Hive. You are our Prime and our only priority.”, it said, calmly. Or rather, emotionless.

Huh. Okay, that explained a few more things. And it at least calmed me somewhat. I looked at the neat row of things it had gathered.

“Is that why you collected all that?”, I asked.

It nodded again, the motion still seeming alien to it. “Yes. You are our Prime and we were tasked with helping you. You need food and materials. So we collected them.”

I looked at it for a moment, trying to figure out the deeper meaning behind that. “Tasked by who? Where am I and why am I here?”, I asked, a little dubiously.

It made a motion as if to shrug. “We don’t know. It simply came to us and asked that we help you. Since that would benefit the Hive we agreed.”

I took a moment to work through that statement. So, something asked it to help me? Who? Why? Where was I?

Before I could say anything it spoke again. “We were only given one tool to help you. It said that once we were separate we would lose it. Do you still have it?”

“Have what?”, I asked, confused. The more it said the less sense things seem to make.

“The thing that helps you open the metal and that saved you from death when you decided to play with an incredibly dangerous mana source”, it said.

“Oh, do you mean this [ERROR] thing? I think so. Let me check”, I said, finally relaxing my stance. I did a quick check of my Interface and found it was still there. That was a relief at least, it would have sucked to lose it.

“Yeah, I still have it. Why?”, I confirmed after a moment.

“Don’t tell anything or anyone you have it.”, it said immediately.

That was only extremely ominous. I understood that it was a powerful tool, and I hadn’t planned to divulge my best tool, but why was it so important that it needed to tell me that?

“Why? Not that I planned to, but why?”, I asked it, getting a bad feeling about this.

“We don’t know. It just told us to tell you. We suppose that eventually it will make sense. We don’t know much, only enough to help. In turn It told us that you will help the Hive. Will you help the Hive?”

While the question was innocent enough, I was pretty sure there was a threat there. Well, I didn’t really want to fight and if it would help me, I suppose the best thing I could do was cooperate. But I wanted to lay down some ground rules.

Once again I reflected on how little this all really affected me, outside my mental protests to all of it. Though, at this point I had to begrudgingly admit that it was at least partially a benefit. It kept me on track while I otherwise would just run away and hide, probably dying within the first week. Still, I had to keep an eye out on myself. If things progressed to far into the “No Fucks Given” mindset I had to be able to pull myself back together.

I contemplated the rules I wanted to lay down. Immediatly the feeling of hunger came to mind that demanded I eat the bodies of the human-esque people in the Cafeteria. That one was going to be an important one. Second, I should make sure they won't multiply and overwhelm me, not until I figure out a way to survive such a situation. I wasn't sure how egg laying worked, but it had eaten a lot of plants during my time sleeping and it might be able to produce more offspring. The last rule was kind of obvious, no harming me. I thought for a good while longer but didn't find anything of immediate import and I could always add to the rules later I figured.

“I suppose, although I have a few conditions. First: No eating sentient beings. Second: No laying Eggs unless I tell you to. Third: No harming me. If I notice you working against me I will not tolerate it, understood?”, I said, trying to project some authority, although I’m pretty sure I failed miserably at that.

It thought for a moment, looking at me. “We cannot lay Eggs in our current body. And those terms seem acceptable, as long as you help the Hive.”

I let out a breath of relief. I really didn’t want to kill it, since it was my first human contact. Well, not human, but close enough. But I also didn’t know what to do if it didn’t accept. I could take over the body, but I really didn’t like that idea either. It somehow felt even worse than just killing it. For the moment I decided to go with it, but at some point I had to sit down and think over everything. Things progressed too fast, and I knew if I didn’t start thinking things through now, I would never be able to catch up.

“Good. For the moment, what do I call you?”, I asked, walking closer carefully, but it didn’t move. It was a kind of surreal experience to see both sides of the conversation, but only knowing what one would do.

“We are the multitude. We are the Hive. We do not have names.”, it said after a moment.

I thought it over for a moment. “Well, I need to call you something. Once you have more bodies things will get confusing. How about I call you Alpha for now?”, I asked.

It shrugged again, which looked a little weird with all those extra limbs, “If you wish. But you could also just mentally order each individual body to do something. That would be faster.”

Huh. I didn’t know I could. Definitely something to keep in mind. For now I walked over to the row of items.

“I’ll keep that in mind. For now, you said I need all of this? What do I need it for? Also, what Evolution Path do you recommend for yourself? I’m still figuring this all out, and since I got mine by accident I don’t know what would be best.”

Honestly, I was kind of hoping that there was one that could lay Eggs while I still was the one in control. I would guess that if they go the Progenitor Hexclaw route I will no longer have control over them, which I didn’t like. But I also didn’t want to go through the trauma of laying another Egg myself.

“You need them for future upgrades. We only know of a few, but they are important. For our Evolution Path, we will be what you need us to be. You are the Prime.”, Alpha replied.

I mulled it over for a moment. It seemed they were exceedingly subservient, which in general was good, since that meant they were less likely to betray me. Or maybe it was just mind games to lower my guard.

Not that I could do much about it.

“Okay. So, is there an Evolution Path that can lay Eggs without it being a Prime or something?”, I asked, not sure if I really like the idea or not.

“Yes. [Hexclaw Hive Princess], [Hexclaw Broodmother]. There might be more, those are the only two we know of.”

Without my prompting my Interface popped up with descriptions of the two.

Hexclaw Hive Princess

The Princess of the Hive, only under authority of the Prime. Capabilities to build the Hive, with Skills to organise and lead the Hive. Physically Weak.

Cannot evolve into a Hexclaw Queen as long as there is an active Prime.

WARNING: If you force the evolution into a Hexclaw Queen it will splinter the Hive.

Evolution can only be forced by the Prime.

Hexclaw Broodmother

A specialised Hexclaw Worker. Can reproduce any designated unit at record speed, but can only reproduce one type of unit. Physically Weak. Incapable of Fighting. Requires large amounts of Biomass.

Well, those options didn’t look too bad. It sounded like the [Hexclaw Princess] can only produce [Hexclaw Hatchlings], while the [Hexclaw Broodmother] can create specific Evolution Path’s.

“For the moment work towards the [Hexclaw Hive Princess] then. We need more Hatchlings before we can go the [Hexclaw Broodmother] route. The issue I see is Biomass. There really isn’t a lot of it around and we need to be careful with its use.”, I said and Alpha bowed, “For that reason make sure you evolve quickly. We will stockpile the Biomass until you reach [Hexclaw Hive Princess].”

Alpha looked at me for a moment, “Why do you not reproduce yourself? It would be faster that way.”

I grimaced. That was an option, yes, but I didn’t like it. I really didn’t like it. But Alpha was right. Especially since I didn’t know if not doing so would go against our deal of helping the Hive.

“I suppose you are correct. But I will only make two more. I know we have a deal but it’s really, really uncomfortable for me.”, I said, hoping that… well, I already gave her a name I might as well call her a she, hoping that she wouldn’t press the issue.

Alpha looked at me for a long moment, obviously thinking. “We do not understand. But you are the Prime.”, she said, then bowed once more.

Once more I grimaced, before I sat down and started eating all the things that Alpha had brought me. She just watched me for a moment, then turned around and wandered off, probably to collect more things, not that I knew for sure.

With resignation and a great deal of discomfort I settled in to lay two more Eggs. Yay…