Chapter 9 - Shifting Sides

Roul was in his tent, solemn face glaring at the flapping wall, as if it might hold all the answers. His sad eyes drifted over the bed Aeris would've used, had she been around any longer.

He wanted to go back, he wanted to save her. But the General said it was too risky now, they'd have to wait a while, let time take over and make them forget. Focus on the powerful hives, focus on the old god. 

Roul was unsociable, unfriendly, ruthless, and cruel now. Without blinking he would slice through the hearts of his foes. Without a second thought he struck down the Silithid everywhere he came across them. Their blood stained his blade. Their bodies littered the sands, left to rot where they were smashed.

He did this out of vengeance. Out of fear that Aeris might be dead. He did not know, but he was fairly sure that she would be dead by now, the Silithid have never been known to keep captives. Then again, little was known about them to begin with. So he clung to that sliver of hope.
--
Aeris groaned awake, it was her third day here. She always awoke the same, stuck to the wall by some gelatinous, orange thing the bugs had plastered on her. She found out she could consume it in small amounts, to give her sustenance, as the bugs did nothing for her in that regard.

As she hung on the wall, she thought about it, maybe they didn't understand her need for food? The bugs consumed the sand they cleared away, and some occasional creatures that had the unfortunate timing to pass by.

One of the beetles that often guarded her drifted by, she fixed it with a stare and spoke to it, about her need for food. In her mind she tried to think of a way to convey it.

The beetle's beady eyes fixated her with a ponderous stare. After a few moments, it seemed to grasp what she had been trying to communicate. It scurried off with a scuttling noise, multiple mandibles clacking as they carried it off and away.

Moments later, it returned with what appeared to be the material of some dead creature, selectively removed from the whole. She cheered excitedly for it. One pincer lifted it to her mouth.

Hungrily she devoured the whole meat, tearing into it with large chomps. She thanked the beetle. It seemed to give some form of nod. Almost faintly, practically in her head, she thought she heard a 'your welcome'. Odd.

Aeris had given up trying to get out, the  weird ensnaring thing that wrapped around her didn't budge.

Her armor hung in shreds, barely still attached to her body anymore. That experience had taught her not to mess with the hive. As a collection they attacked, and their pincers ripped steel links, she didn't want to think of what they did to flesh.

She drifted back to sleep, there wasn't much else to do when you couldn't move.
~
Her eyelids lazily drifted open, and she was confronted with the hovering form of the Brood Father.

Her back was against cold stone, and her body was naked, she could feel the warm air inside the hive. At her wrists and ankles, small orange crystals held her in place. At each binding, a Silithid rested, watching her, to see her movement.

The thing above her was basked in the warm glow of orange, emanating from the walls. A thick tentacle pushed out from it, and caressed her stomach slowly. Aeris found the feeling strange. It was a warm extension, but the odd wet coating on her abdomen felt odd. A scent permeated the air around us. It elated her, for an odd reason. Things seemed far more sexual then they normally would be.

The soft tentacle slipped down to her crotch and swirled around her nethers for a bit, teasing them in a way.

Grating, the noise of chitin scraping chitin softly clicked into the chamber, and a much larger, thick tube descended from the Brood Father. It positioned itself before her private region.

She stared at it, in slight confusion at first, Silithid didn't mate with humanoids, did they? She thought it unlikely, until it penetrated her. With a forceful shove, it made its way into her Birth Canal.

But this thing was not here for enjoyment or pleasures of the flesh. No, it had a duty, and it rammed itself into her womb. With an odd sense of foreboding, Aeris looked up. Coming down the tube were several large, bulbous blips. She watched as they made their way through the tentacle.

They neared her opening, and she felt them squeeze into her, one at a time. The feeling of the stretching was semi-painful, not enough to warrant a shout of pain, but enough to make her wince.

Four more passed into her, and they kept entering, until her belly expanded, and she looked pregnant. At last the Brood Father pulled out. A wet sucking noise tailed his removal.

Aeris groaned, and passed out. The experience had been slightly painful, and oddly exhausting for her, and she felt heavy with the stomach increase.
~
She had remained hanging from the wall for another day or so. Every so often, one of the Silithid would bring something for her to eat, a portion of meat or some of the orange gelatin.

She had felt upset over the other day, when the Brood Father had done whatever it was he had done. She felt used. It was a strange feeling for her, though she had felt it once before. The other bugs around the cave seemed to stare at her as they went by, some would completely stop and just watch her. She had a captive audience once, and told them tales of times past, despite the fact that she doubted they understood her.

Aeris seemed to permanently have that buzz in her mind now, like hearing something that's just outside of your discernible range. Occasionally she'd catch a word or two, a snipit of a conversation, a stray phrase. None of it made sense to her, but she felt good for having heard it.

As the days ran together, she would drift in and out of sleep sporadically, and the time seemed to drip by like water through open hands.
~
She awoke, almost a week after the event with the Father, strapped once more to the altar. Except this time, the Brood Father didn't make a maneuver toward her, and instead hovered above, watching.

Her stomach flexed and shifted. Whatever was there started moving. Then, like a small army, tiny Silithid exited her birth canal. Instead of being horrified and disgusted, she immediately felt a sense of motherhood to the creatures. She felt like they were hers.

The links on her arms and legs let go, and she turned toward her 'children' as she thought of them. She wrapped her arms around them, murmuring. To anyone normal it was an odd sight. She guided one to her breast, where it bit, trying to find milk. After a while, the beetles took her away once more, and with a longing look on her face, she walked with them, facing her bugs.

The buzzing was more clear, she could catch almost whole sentences now. It was a fun game for her, to try and hear what was going on in the buzzing. Aeris talked more often with the beetles, who more regularly came and sat in front of her. She was no longer bound with the gelatin, instead, they blocked the walls in such a way so she couldn't pass through.

Every so often, the bugs that had come from her were let into the room, and she would play with them for hours on end.
~
She woke up in the Brood Father's room once more. Two tentacles floated next to her. Aeris was not bound up again. One of the tentacles was the one that had impregnated her with the odd bugs. The other was a slim one, segmented and pulsing, the tip slightly rounded. She stared at the creature, and a few words dripped into her mind.

Pleasure, birth, Mother, and Hybrid. She assumed, with a great leap in conclusions, that the second tube was his pleasure tube, the other one had been used for a sole purpose, the second must be for the other usage of her.
~
Weeks passed by like this, she would be with the Brood Father, or her children. The beetles even began using her for mounting purposes. She felt of them as if they were all apart of her. She was connected to their hive mind fully now. Her children wound around her. She roamed freely in the corridors. Feeding her children with the strange liquid that came from her breasts, talking with the other beetles, serving the Brood Father, she did it all.
--
The Silithid had been pushed back. With the relentless onslaught of both the Horde and the Alliance, the door way to Ahn'Qiraj was now open and ready for invasion. However, to insure victory, they were systematically destroying the various hives around Silithus before invasion time.

One of the few hives left was the one that Roul was most determined to visit. The one that he had lost Aeris in. In fact, he was to lead to assault into it. At the command of nearly fifty troops, they were to march in and slay the Brood Father, and any consorts of his.

Roul needed to know if she was alive or dead. By now he was certain she was dead, but he at least wanted her bones.
--
Aeris moaned as the Brood Father's pleasure tube pumped into her. A regular thing this was, now. His tentacles provided endless entertainment for Aeris. They would twist and enter simultaneously, they would enter two different openings and pump back and forth, they would twist around inside her. The whole event was more fun than anything else. Aside from her children, she thought.

At the current moment, she was being penetrated by a single tube, she was laying on her back, breasts rolling softly with each push and shove. Beetles and her Children sat around the room watching, several wishing they were there instead of the Brood Father.

He lifted her up on the tube and bounced her in the air, violently tossing her breasts, and electing moans and groans from her. Sweat was shaken from her as Aeris was sexed abound by the Father.

His endings were always the most boring part, in Aeris's opinion. They finished with him simply removing himself from her. Never any final orgasm, or ejaculation. Just a clean cut ending.

After this one, she sighed in relief, relaxing ever so slightly, as the Brood Father retracted into his ceiling hiding place. The beetles swarmed up to her, fighting for positions to mount her. She felt somewhat embarrassed about this, and almost like she was a whore. She quickly dismissed the thought, as it was becoming hard to dwell on with beetles trying to have intercourse with her.

A few of the smaller of her children were at her breasts, nipping for milk. She gazed down at herself and sighed, she had changed.
--
The doorway that Aeris had destroyed was still closed. Roul decided they must have a different entrance, obviously. However, they blew the front door open. The explosion rocked the ground around his small army, they stumbled and a few lost their balance.
--
The cave shook, small pebbles fell. The Beetles scattered, the eldest of her children dispersed with them. The youngest fled to their mother, clinging onto her body. The Brood Father poked and eye down.

In the ground, embedded, was her spear. She had left it there, for the sake of remembering that she had been normal once, and to mark the greatest thing to ever happen to her. It fit into her hands perfectly. A few warrior scarabs lined up before her, scuttling out from the ground where they burrowed.
--
Roul marched at the spearhead, his gear clanking as he drew forward. He took the turn Aeris had when they first came here. Inside he found a large chamber, and a small force before him.

Medium-sized scarabs rested with sharpened spines and razor edged pincers. Their carapaces looked thick compared to the others. A giant eye-stalk extended from the ceiling, the large yellow eye fixing them with its unblinking gaze. The flesh connected to it pulsed every so often.

But the crown jewel was the humanoid standing before them. Jet black chitin armor plates covered the skin from foot to thigh, stomach to lower ribcage, arms and the neck. Deep colored skin showed from where it did not defend. Hard, black nipples stood out, exposed to the air. Some of the men eyed her exposed sex organs. Her face, was the most striking. Slightly lighter than the skin below it, the face had pink lips, and haunting yellow eyes. Brown hair that was jaggedly cut rested atop it. Faintly they could see white fangs behind the beautiful lips.

Roul couldn't stop himself, he gazed at her. He felt almost sensual in her presence. She seemed to be drawing them out of the military mind set they were in. He shook his head, he would let no other woman try to take Aeris's place. She lowered the massive spear in her arms to a disarming position. Seductively she stalked forward, a grin on her features.

"And whom are our esteemed guests?" She inquiried, a wanton look on her face. Behind her the scarabs retracted. When she drew near, they noticed small bugs crawling across her skin. They fled when she got close enough to hold a conversation properly, into the ground they ran.

Roul glared, "We are the Horde forces, here to destroy you. I am the sin'dorei that leads this group. Not that it matters to those who should already be considered dead." He remarked cruelly.

Her eyes narrowed to slits. "Sin'dorei? Tell me, what is your name?" Beneath a sand mask, Roul's breathing came in quick pants. This woman was strange, a seductress for sure. All the men were reacting poorly to what she was doing. They gawked at her with open mouths.

"Roul Brightfinger." His voice was grave and solemn. She laughed at him.

"Ah, where are my manners. Let me introduce myself. I am the Brood Queen here. And these are my children." She gestured to the bugs hiding behind the cave. Her spear acted as a pointer for her. "I am the Hybrid, if you prefer that to Brood Mother or Queen." She added, her silky voice drawing more men in with its subtle notes.

"Hybrid? So you were once of one of the humanoid races?" Roul ventured. This could be useful information.

"Oh yes. You might even recognize my name," Her fangs gleamed with a wicked grin, "I am Aeris Hawkrider."

Roul took the blow heavy, staggering back. "A-Aeris?" He mumbled, she smiled at him. His defenses fell, and he felt himself under her sway.

"I've changed a bit, I know. But that is not why you're here. You traitors left me to die in this cave. But I'm not one to hold a grudge any longer. Roul, come once more, this night. We will try to achieve a diplomatic end to this. I'd prefer not to kill you all." She cackled, turning her back. Exposed backside swaying with the swing of her hips. Several men doubled over.

Roul could do nothing but nod and pull his men back. He was in no shape to face her as he was, or maybe ever. But he knew he needed to return to the base camp if nothing else.

His report left nothing untold, down to the details of her body, of the creatures in the room, of the way she acted, of her message, of her. His thoughts kept turning back to her.

She felt betrayed, why? They hadn't tried to save her. They'd instead waited a long time, months, it seemed to Roul. The cold realization hit him, if he didn't work something out, he'd have to kill her.

Himself.