DAYS SURVIVED: 132
COLONY SIZE: 15
DAYS UNTIL FLOODS: 63
The territorial dispute started with a missing patrol.
Quick had been running evening reconnaissance—standard route, well-established, should have taken two hours maximum. When the scout didn't return after four hours, Kai activated emergency protocols.
"Twitchy, secure the den. Shadow, coordinate search teams. Watchers, track Quick's last known pheromone trail."
The four Watchers moved with their characteristic unsettling efficiency, processing scent markers, calculating vectors, producing a probability map in under three minutes.
Last confirmed position: Northern barrier zone. Trail terminates abruptly. Chemical signature consistent with predation event or forced displacement. Probability of survival: 34%.
"Thirty-four percent," Kai repeated. "What's causing the uncertainty?"
No blood detected. No dismemberment markers. Either Quick escaped and is hiding, or Quick was captured intact. Insufficient data for definitive conclusion.
"Captured?" Shadow said. "By what? We don't have any species in the area that take prisoners."
Guard approached from the combat unit barracks. "The centipede. It's smart enough. It might keep prey alive to study our patrol patterns."
Kai's blood ran cold. The centipede that had destroyed their first den. The one that had learned to avoid direct confrontation with multiple colonies. The one that had been seen moving toward high ground.
"Watchers, expand the search. Focus on centipede territory markers. If Quick's alive, that's where they'll be."
The search took six hours. They found Quick at dawn, badly injured but alive, trapped in a narrow crevice in what was clearly centipede territory—deep claw marks on surrounding stone, chemical markers that screamed MINE in the universal language of predators.
Quick had a broken leg. Multiple lacerations. Exhaustion that suggested hours of running.
"Got too close," Quick whispered as Patch began emergency treatment. "Didn't see the boundary markers. It was waiting. Chased me. I hid. It kept searching. Couldn't move without being seen. Couldn't call for help without attracting it."
"Where is it now?" Kai asked.
"Still there. Patrolling. It's claimed the whole northern section of the barrier zone. Everything north of the split rock."
Watcher-2 was already mapping the implications: Centipede territorial claim encompasses 23% of neutral barrier zone. This violates established boundaries with ant colony. Also blocks our primary water access route. Recommend immediate diplomatic response.
"Diplomatic response," Bitey scoffed. "You mean fight it."
"No," Kai said firmly. "We can't win a fight with that thing. Not without casualties we can't afford. But we also can't let it take our water access. Shadow, get a message to Scar-Mandible. This affects the ants too. See if they want to present a united front."
The meeting happened at midday in the barrier zone—as far from both the centipede's claimed territory and the established colony zones as possible.
Kai brought Shadow, Guard, and Watcher-1. Scar-Mandible brought three of their largest soldiers.
Water access is critical, Scar-Mandible's pheromones stated without preamble. Centipede's claim blocks both our routes. This is unacceptable.
"Agreed. But we can't fight it alone. Neither can you. Together, we might have a chance."
Or we negotiate. Establish new boundaries. Concede northern territory in exchange for guaranteed water access.
"That sets a precedent. If we give ground now, what stops the scorpions from trying the same thing? Or the spiders? We'll be negotiating territory constantly instead of preparing for the floods."
Alternative: Eliminate the threat. Combined assault. Your combat unit plus our soldier force. Forty-five attackers total. Overwhelming odds.
"And how many casualties? Five? Ten? Can either of us afford to lose that many fighters with sixty-three days left?"
The debate continued for an hour. Finally, Watcher-1 spoke up—unusual, since the Watchers typically only contributed when directly addressed.
Third option: Containment. We do not fight centipede directly. We do not negotiate. We make the northern territory uninhabitable. Collapse tunnels. Eliminate prey base. Force centipede to relocate naturally.
Both Kai and Scar-Mandible stopped to consider this.
"Scorched earth," Shadow said. "Make the territory worthless so the centipede leaves on its own."
Precisely. Minimal casualties. Maintains territorial precedent—we do not concede, but we do not engage in costly war. Centipede relocates, we reclaim neutral zone, both colonies retain water access.
"How long would it take?" Kai asked.
With combined labor force: 8-10 days. Requires coordination. Requires trust.
Scar-Mandible's antennae twitched thoughtfully. Proposal has merit. But requires significant trust. Your colony and our colony working together in close proximity. Many opportunities for betrayal.
"Then we use hostages," Shadow suggested. "Not prisoners—honored guests. I'll stay in your colony while the work happens. One of your key advisors stays in ours. If either side betrays the other, they lose someone important."
Hostage exchange. Barbaric but effective. Scar-Mandible paused. Acceptable. We agree to Watcher's plan. Begin in two days. Give both colonies time to prepare.
DAYS SURVIVED: 134
The engineering project was massive.
Dig led the excavation teams—a mix of World Cats and ants working in shifts. They collapsed tunnels systematically, starting from the deepest sections and working outward. The centipede's claimed territory became a maze of dead ends and unstable passages.
Simultaneously, hunting teams from both colonies eliminated every prey species in the northern zone. Beetles, grubs, spiders—anything the centipede might feed on. They cached the kills in their own territories, effectively transferring the biomass away from the target area.
The centipede noticed on day three.
Kai watched from a safe distance as the massive predator emerged from its lair, mandibles clicking in agitation. It moved through its territory, finding collapsed tunnels, empty hunting grounds, destabilized structures.
The predator was intelligent enough to understand: this territory was being deliberately destroyed.
On day five, the centipede tried to retaliate.
It attacked an ant work crew, killing two soldiers before Guard's hunters drove it back. The centipede retreated to its lair, reassessing.
On day seven, it tried a different approach. It attacked a World Cat work crew—specifically targeting Dig, recognizing the constructor as the key to the demolition.
Bitey and Tank held the line while Dig escaped. Tank took a hit—a mandible strike that cracked armor and drew hemolymph. But the heavy defender didn't fall. Just absorbed the damage and held position until the centipede withdrew.
Patch worked on Tank for six hours. "The armor saved them. Barely. Another hit like that and Tank's done."
"Will they recover?" Kai asked.
"Physically? Yes. Psychologically?" Patch's compound eyes met Kai's. "Tank is starting to understand what 'defensive anchor' really means. It means taking hits nobody else can survive. That's a heavy burden."
"Can Tank handle it?"
"Ask them, not me. I fix bodies, not minds."
Kai found Tank in the defender's usual position—the narrow pass between rock formations. The heavy kit was moving slower than usual, favoring the injured side.
"How are you feeling?" Kai asked.
"Like I got hit by a centipede," Tank said dryly. "But functional. Ready to hold the line again if needed."
"Do you resent it? Being the one who takes the hits?"
Tank considered the question carefully. "Is that something I can resent? You made me to be a wall. Walls don't complain about impacts. They just stand."
"You're not just a wall. You're a person."
"Am I? Or am I a person-shaped wall? What's the difference between being designed for a purpose and being programmed for one, like the Watchers?"
Kai didn't have a good answer. "The difference is you can choose to walk away. You can refuse to be the wall."
"Can I? Really? Or is the urge to protect, to hold position, to take hits for others—is that just genetic encoding I can't see? Maybe I'm not much different from the Watchers. Just blind to my own programming."
"You're choosing to stay. That's different."
"Or my genetics are choosing for me, and I'm interpreting it as free will because that feels better."
Kai sat beside Tank, both of them looking out over their defended territory.
"I don't know," Kai admitted. "Maybe none of us are as free as we think. Maybe we're all just following biological programming and calling it choice. But if that's true, then at least you're following programming that makes you noble. Protective. Heroic. That counts for something."
"Does it? Does it count if I didn't choose it?"
"You're choosing to question it. The Watchers can't even do that. So you're at least one step more free than them."
Tank absorbed this. "Small comfort. But I'll take it."
On day eight, the centipede left.
The Watchers documented the departure clinically: Centipede vacating territory at 0847 hours. Heading southwest. Speed suggests permanent relocation rather than temporary retreat. Mission objective achieved.
Both colonies celebrated cautiously. The hostage exchange completed without incident—Shadow returned from the ant colony reporting excellent treatment, and the ant advisor returned with similar praise for World Cat hospitality.
"We did it," Shadow said that evening. "Cooperation worked. No war. Minimal casualties. Problem solved."
"Two ants dead," Kai reminded them. "Tank injured. Quick still recovering. That's not 'minimal' when we can't afford to lose anyone."
"It's minimal compared to what direct combat would have cost. This was smart. Surgical. Professional."
"It was also exhausting. Eight days of intensive labor. Resources we could have spent on flood preparation."
"But now we have water access. And we've proven the alliance works. That matters."
Kai couldn't argue. The alliance with Scar-Mandible had evolved from convenience to genuine partnership. They'd worked together, trusted each other, succeeded together.
It was the kind of cooperation the vanished civilization on the carved stones had probably never achieved. Maybe that's why they'd failed.
"Fifty-five days," Kai said. "Less than two months. We need to accelerate preparations."
"What's left to prepare?"
"Everything. We're ready for the floods themselves, but not for what comes after. The flood predators. The resource scarcity. The territorial pressure when dozens of colonies are crammed onto high ground together. We need more supplies. More defensive positions. More contingencies."
"You're never going to feel ready, are you?" Shadow said gently.
"No. But I can get close enough that 'not ready' doesn't mean 'dead.'"
DAYS SURVIVED: 142
COLONY SIZE: 15
DAYS UNTIL FLOODS: 48
The nightmares started on day 140.
Kai would dream of Chicago. His mother. The lottery ticket. But twisted now. Corrupted by what he'd become.
In the dreams, he'd won the lottery. He'd saved his mother. But he'd done it by creating slaves to work the jobs neither of them wanted to do. Genetically engineered humans with limited free will, programmed to serve, unable to refuse.
His mother would look at him with horror. "Baby, what did you do?"
"What I had to do to survive. To keep us both alive."
"But at what cost? At what cost?"
He'd wake up then, surrounded by his fifteen kits, and wonder if she'd be more horrified by the Watchers or proud that he'd kept a family alive.
He suspected horrified.
Shadow noticed the sleep disruption. "You're getting worse. More paranoid. More obsessive. When's the last time you actually rested?"
"I'll rest after the floods."
"You'll collapse before the floods if you keep this up. You need to delegate more. Let me handle some of the planning."
"I can't—"
"Yes, you can. You have to. Because if you break, we all break. That's what being a leader means. Knowing when to let others carry weight."
Kai looked at Shadow—his first heir, his conscience, his moral compass—and felt the weight of it all.
"Okay," he said. "You're right. You handle supply caching and defensive preparation. I'll focus on threat assessment and crisis response planning. We split the load."
"And you sleep. Minimum four hours per cycle. Non-negotiable."
"Four hours—"
"Non-negotiable," Shadow repeated firmly. "Or I'm calling a vote of no confidence and taking command myself."
Kai blinked. "You'd actually do that?"
"To save you from yourself? Absolutely. You taught me to make hard calls. This is one of them."
"When did you get so good at this?"
"I learned from the best." Shadow paused. "Before he started creating slaves and forgetting to sleep."
The barb hit home. But it was fair.
"Four hours minimum," Kai agreed. "Starting tonight."
DAYS SURVIVED: 145
The expansion debate came to a head during a command meeting.
"We need more kits," Twitchy argued. "Fifteen isn't enough for what's coming. We should breed up to twenty before the floods."
"We can't support twenty," Patch countered. "Our food caches are calculated for fifteen with buffer. Twenty means we run out faster, need more hunting, more risk."
"We also can't split the colony if we need to," Quick added. "Fifteen can divide into three teams of five. Twenty is awkward—four teams of five leaves nobody in reserve, or two tens with no middle option."
"The Watchers can serve as reserve," Watcher-3 suggested. Its voice was still unnervingly flat, but the Watchers had been trying to integrate better since the revelation. Small improvements. Marginal personality development within their mission constraints.
"The Watchers serve as intelligence," Shadow corrected gently. "We've been over this. You're support, not combat reserve."
Noted. Recommendation: Add three more combat specialists. Brings total to eighteen. Divisible by two, three, six, or nine. Maximum tactical flexibility.
"Three more kits means Kai loses significant mass again," Patch said. "He's barely recovered from the last breeding cycle. Another one could be dangerous."
All eyes turned to Kai.
"I can do it," he said. "Three more. Combat specialists to back up the hunters. We need the flexibility."
"When?" Shadow asked.
"After the floods. We breed when we're safe, not when we're in crisis mode. We survive with fifteen, then expand to eighteen in the recovery period."
The council accepted this. Practical. Measured. Responsible.
But Kai wondered if he was making the right call. Fifty-five days left and he was choosing not to expand. What if fifteen wasn't enough?
What if the margin between survival and extinction was exactly three kits?
That night, Kai sat with the carved stones again. Seven warnings from a vanished people.
Stone 7—the Maker standing alone—seemed to judge him with its blank carved face.
"Did you make slaves too?" Kai whispered to the stone. "Is that why you failed? Because you crossed lines you shouldn't have crossed?"
The stone didn't answer.
But in his mind, Kai could almost hear Ilen Korr's voice from that first moment of consciousness: Survive. Adapt. Become what they feared.
He'd done all three. He'd survived. He'd adapted. And he'd become something that scared even himself.
Forty-seven days until the floods.
The countdown continued.