Happy new year!
Disclaimer: I don't anything that doesn't belong to me.
Goro gazed up at the elegant, gleaming Hive transport as it gracefully landed on the base helipad. "I guess this is it," he murmured to himself. "No turning back now."
He had said his goodbyes. While he knew he would be seeing everyone again soon, something about this felt… Final. Like the next time he saw his friends, his family, everything would be different. He would be different.
He wasn't sure how to feel about that.
"You seem uneasy, partner," Formic commented from his place on Goro's shoulder. "What's wrong?"
Goro's face twisted briefly at that. He wasn't sure how he felt about this strange, alien mechanical insect God calling him "partner." He didn't feel like he had earned that title just yet. He wasn't sure if he wanted that title, either. "I've built a life for myself here. A family, both in and out of uniform. Katsutoshi Squad… It's more than just a unit. My father started it, and a part of me feels like I'm betraying his memory by leaving it."
"If your father was anything like you," Formic offered helpfully. "I'm sure he would understand."
"He probably would," Goro admitted. "But all the same… Something tells me that I'm never going to be a part of it again. Once I step in that shuttle, everything changes."
"Is that a bad thing?" Formic inquired. "For insects like myself, change is usually welcome. Metamorphosis is a given, a way to constantly grow into better and brighter versions of ourselves."
"Yeah, well, change is a lot harder for humans to stomach," Goro muttered.
Formic regarded him for a moment. "I don't really understand your species," he confessed. "Don't worry, though. We'll both be understanding each other a lot better soon enough."
Goro frowned at him, puzzled. "What's that supposed to mean-"
"Lieutenant Aori!"
Goro reflexively stiffened and turned around, giving a salute. "Sir!"
Captain Kazuta and the rest of Katsutoshi Squad had walked out of the hangar and were standing at the edge of the helipad. "At ease, soldier," Kazuta said, barely hiding a smile.
"Sir, what are you all doing here?" Goro asked, surprised.
Kamiya laughed. "You didn't think we'd let you go without seeing you off properly, did you?"
Hebishima nodded. "You may not be part of the squad anymore… But you'll also always be part of the squad, you know?"
"Katsutoshi is in your blood. You may be leaving it now, but one way or another, you will always find your way back to it, to us, somehow," Takeshi declared.
"Goro… You're leaving me some big shoes to fill, but I promise I'll do my best, just like you'd better promise to do your best!" Fukiyami cried.
Kazuta gave his mentee a steely, appraising look. "Goro. On your new assignment to aid the Hive, you not only represent the best of the JSDF… But the best humanity has to offer! We know you will not let us down!"
Tears in his eyes, Goro had to keep himself from breaking down and embracing his comrades. "The thought never crossed my mind, sir."
All five of them saluted him. "Go forth, Lieutenant First Class Goro Aori! Show the Swarm why humanity has yet to be conquered, despite everything the universe has thrown us!" Kazuta barked. "Make us proud! For the honor of Katsutoshi!"
"For the honor of Katsutoshi!" The other four echoed.
Vision blurring from unshed tears, Goro saluted back, bellowing, "For the honor of Katsutoshi!"
"You know, your father seems like a good commander," Formic commented a few minutes later, once he and Goro were seated in the transport and they started lifting off.
"The captain is not my father," Goro said reflexively, staring out the window at Kazuta and the rest the squad, who were still saluting as they watched him go.
"Really? Because he seemed to look at you as if you were," a surprised Formic noted.
Goro smiled, saluting Kazuta one last time before the transport moved out of range. "That's just the way he always looks at me."
Formic chuckled knowingly. Goro didn't bother asking why. Deep down, he already knew the answer.
Goro's bullet flew true, impacting the emergency release on the side of the X-Buckle. All of the eyes and Xs started flashing, and Parasitica looked at her body in confusion as steam started venting from the suit. "What? What have you just done?"
"Disengaged the suit," Goro replied, still keeping his gun focused on her in case she made any sudden moves. "Since it doesn't work without someone to wear it, that means that once it's off the captain, it'll shut down and you'll lose whatever connection you have to it. You won't be hurting anyone else today."
"You fool! Without the armor's life support, you'll kill him!" Parasitica cried incredulously as seams started to form all over the warped armor, the pieces gradually starting to come apart.
"The captain is a stronger man than you think," Goro replied. "And even if his heart stops the instant you're off him completely… We're currently on top of a time machine. Shin can just jump us directly to Hive City where we can dump Kazuta in a vat of miracle honey and bring us back before any time is passed at all! While that honey isn't quite a cure-all elixir, there's very little it can't fix, and I'm betting that doesn't include what you've done to his body!"
"No… No! It can't end like this! I refuse to be defeated this way!" Parasitica shrieked in denial as the helmet started to split apart.
Goro grinned triumphantly as, bit by bit, he could see more of Kazuta's body through the growing cracks in the armor. "You don't have a choice."
Cheers rang throughout the Buzzing. "Well done, Goro!" Nushi congratulated him.
"Great job, Lieutenant!" Katsutoshi Squad cried.
"An excellent shot, as always," Mibojin noted.
"I'm prepping the time drive now, the instant that armor's fully off, we're making the jump to Hive City, coordinates locked to the biggest hospital in the city," Shin promised.
"The medics are already preparing a miracle honey bath and a full round of treatment. Don't worry, Goro, we'll save him!" Apista vowed.
"Goro… thank you…" A relieved Kazuta whispered, his pain getting, if anything, worse as the life-support disengaged, but his hope and relief made it more palatable somehow.
"No! My specimen!" X cried. "Well, maybe I can salvage something from the armor-"
"You're not getting anywhere near him!" Fukiyami snarled, Orcteel hissing and spraying Ptryranno with electrified ink, causing X to cry out as his mecha was electrified and his vision dropped to zero.
"You've already done enough to the captain, and us, and Ms. Cheng! This ends now!" Hebishima shouted, Stanper springing off the side of the building and slashing Ptryranno with its mantis blades.
"Mine are sharper," Great Manti sniffed, unimpressed.
"Today, X marks the spot for PAIN!" Kamiya whooped as Gorhphant fired a double rocket punch into Ptryranno's chest, nearly knocking the beast out of the air.
"And let's give you a few more Xs while we're at it!" Takeshi sang as Ligerah pounced , digging its claws and fangs into Ptryranno's side.
"You really did have a great squad," Ariel noted in approval.
Goro chuckled. "I still do."
"No… NO! I will not fail like this! I… REFUSE!"
Startled, and sensing a sudden spike in pain from Kazuta, Goro whirled around just in time to see the impossible happening: the armor was starting to pull itself back together!
As he watched in disbelief, tendrils of fungus with centipedes wrapped around them spurted out from the moldy plates making up the majority of the armor, intertwining with one another to create a disgusting, slimy mass of webbing which Aranea would have rightfully turned up her nose at as a mockery of her species' craft. With a cry of fury from Parasitica – and a howl of agony from Kazuta – the plates snapped back together, more mold growing over the various seams in the suit to solidly glue them shot.
"I am… Not… Going… ANYWHERE!" Parasitica roared triumphantly
"Captain!" A horrified Fukiyami cried.
Shin swore and started powering down the time drive. "Dammit! Should have known it wouldn't be that easy!"
"It never is," Ariel lamented.
Goro trembled, clenching his teeth as Kazuta ' anguished sobs echoed throughout the Buzzing. He found that he was unsurprised by this turn of events. Disappointed, but unsurprised. "Guess I'm going to have to do this the hard way, then…"
"Incredible!" X exclaimed. "It was able to override the failsafe!"
"You say that like it's hard!" Nushi shouted, Great Kabuto firing another powerful laser shot at Ptryranno.
"I am not an it, I am a she!" Parasitica snapped at X. "And my name is-"
She was interrupted when Goro tackled her, ramming a shoulder into her gut and bringing his gun up in an uppercut, firing a bullet straight into her chin and snapping her head back. As she shrieked in fury, Goro wrapped his arms around her waist, ignoring how her claws scratched at his back, and hurled her into the air with all his might. He immediately fired his grapnel at her, rocketed up towards her, and drove an elbow into her face before she could recover.
"Shin!" He shouted, exchanging frenzied blows with Parasitica as they tumbled through the air once again. "Detach the last car!"
"You're insane! I love it. Detaching car now!" Shin cried.
As the ShinLiner's last car decoupled from the rest and started falling through the air, Goro fired a powerful burst into Parasitica's stomach, blasting both of them away, then fired his grapnel at the attached car, rocketing up towards it. The moment he reached it he quickly started running up the side, his magnetized boots allowing him to keep his footing even as the car spun end over end, and leapt off the other side, flipping over and pointing his gun downward, quickly running the calculations necessary to pull off this latest absolutely crazy stunt.
His friends in Katsutoshi squad, reading his mind and seeing what he was about to do, were flabbergasted. "Are you serious?!" Takeshi cried.
"Goro, even for you, that's-" Kamiya swore.
"Par for the course for the greatest shot on Earth!" Ariel declared.
"Hey, Parasitica!" Goro shouted, squeezing the trigger of his blaster as he charged up power. "Remember the time we ran you over with a train?" He grinned, the cameras in his helmet allowing him to pick up the horrified expression on the evil queen's face from dozens of meters away. "Care for another go?"
He pulled the trigger, blasting the rear of the car with just enough force to send it on a collision course with the wide-eyed Parasitica.
"Oh, not again-" she managed to get out, just before the car slammed into her, and both of them crashed into King's Tower.
Goro immediately fired his grapnel at the building and zipped towards the structure, striking the back of the car feet first to push it further into the skyscraper while also kicking open the rear door, rolling as he landed inside so that he was up on his feet within seconds and racing through the wrecked interior.
"Aw man, and we just redid the carpeting," Shin complained.
"I'll help you lay down new carpet later," Goro promised, drawing his gun and shooting a bullet at the door at the far end, catching Parasitica in the face just as she pried the doors open, causing her to flinch and stagger back, allowing Goro to finish his charge and tackle her to the ground, the two of them sliding across the floor and tearing up the carpet of the office space they crashed into – which Goro had no intention of replacing, Kougami could pay people to do that – firing round after round into her face.
There was a lot of screaming. Some of it Parasitica, some of it Kazuta, and some of it even Goro himself.
Parasitica finally managed to dig her oversized left arm into the ground and stop their skid, twisting her legs up in a way Kazuta's legs were definitely not meant to go, grabbing Goro around the waist and hurling him away. Her tentacles and right arm then shot out – Kazuta's arm was definitely not supposed to stretch out that far – grabbed the ShinLiner car, and with a cry of effort, pulled the entire thing into the building and swept it across the ground, smashing through walls, ceilings, cubicles, offices, and water coolers, meaning the workers wouldn't have anywhere to congregate to talk about what had caused all the damage to their workspace.
Goro immediately fired a blast at the ground beneath his feet, creating a hole which he quickly fell through just before the car could slam into him. He barely had a moment to catch his breath before Parasitica smashed through the ceiling not too far away, shrieking and writhing her tentacles. Goro drew his gun as she rushed at him…
And then there was a low, groaning sound.
The two of them glanced up and saw cracks rapidly forming in the ceiling. "The floors of this building weren't meant to support train cars, were they?" Parasitica asked with a natural calm.
Goro shook his head. "No. Quite the oversight on Kougami's part, considering the sorts of people he's a patron to."
They both dove to the side as the ceiling caved in, the ShinLiner car smashing through, hitting the ground, and breaking through that as well, crash after crash echoing throughout the building as it kept plummeting down the tower. The two combatants quickly started scrambling away as the floor surrounding the hole formed by the car's passage, weakened by the impact, also started collapsing into the new shaft.
The ground tore open beneath Parasitica's feet as she lunged for safety, and she fell, screaming, into the pit. Goro, on the other hand, managed to catch the edge of the hole with his fingertips just before he could fall as well. He cried out as pain shot up through his arm – dammit, he had hurt the same one during the freefall earlier – but didn't lose his grip…
Or at least, he didn't until Parasitica's right arm shot out, grabbed his foot, and pulled him down after her.
As Goro found himself falling yet again, Parasitica reeled her arm in, locking him to her chest in a deadly embrace. As floor after floor of the skyscraper flew past them, Goro could swear he saw the Kamen Riders who had come to help out stop in their fight against minions who hadn't gotten the memo yet that the battle was supposed to be over and did a double take as they shot by. Goro wondered idly if they found his and Parasitica's struggle stranger than the train car that had preceded them.
"You really must stop falling for me," Parasitica jeered as she held him tighter, spikes growing from her limbs to dig into his suit.
"Trust me when I say that you aren't my type," Goro retorted, tilting his neck back before snapping his head forward, slamming it into her face with a fierce headbutt that got his head ringing. "And besides, I'm happily married! With children!"
Parasitica seemed genuinely confused at this. "Why would that matter?"
Oh, right, Hive marital norms were different than human, especially where royalty was concerned. Silly of him to forget.
"If he's not your type, how about me?"
Shouts from his friends was all the warning he got before Ptryranno's head smashed through the wall and snatched them out of the air in its jaws. As it withdrew back outside the tower, Goro, grunting as the monster's mechanical fangs dug into his sides, could see that the Rider Beast had switched into its more powerful humanoid form, Ptryranno's head forming its left arm, while the tail was now a sword held in the right. The legs and wings remained about the same, but the torso had twisted sideways to accommodate the head and tail becoming limbs, while a smaller, vaguely humanoid head had popped up from the top of what had once been the mecha's back, somewhat reminiscent of Dr. Maki's Greeed form but with an X-shaped visor.
The mad scientist cackled with delight that he finally had his precious specimen in his grasp. "At last, I finally have my precious specimen in my grasp!" He cried.
"Do you?" Parasitica leered. "Or are you right where I want you?"
And suddenly, patches of mold started creeping across the surface of Ptryranno's head.
"What?!" X cried.
"You idiot! The Rider Beasts have traces of cosmic fungus in them too!" Goro yelled at him. "She's trying to reactivate them and turn your robot into a Fungigas!"
Parasitica scoffed at him. "Spoil all my fun, why don't you."
"OH SHIT!" X shrieked, hurriedly throwing them away.
And, once again, they were falling…
"GOTCHA!"
Until they weren't, Gorhphant having snatched Parasitica out of the air with one hand while clinging to the tower with the other, and Orcteel, who had slithered up the side of the structure, catching Goro in one of its tentacles.
"You okay, Lieutenant?" Fukiyami asked him.
"I am, but Kamiya isn't!" A worried Goro pointed out. "Gorhphant has cosmic fungus too-"
"Which won't be a problem, once I FINALLY exorcise Parasitica!" Ariel, positioned on the plaza directly beneath them, cried, charging up her magic.
"No! If you do that, then any knowledge we can glean from this unprecedented parasitism will be lost!" X protested. "Nushi, you're always trying to find new ways to combat the Swarm and figure out a way to eradicate cosmic fungus, right? Just imagine what you'll be able to learn from studying that infected armor!"
"Right now, I'm more concerned with saving Goro's friend," Nushi replied as Great Kabuto attempted to ram Ptryranno, or rather, Ptryrann-o. "All else is secondary!"
X pouted. "Well that's not very scientific!"
"Hurry, Miss Ozu!" Kamiya cried, glancing nervously at his mecha's fist, which was starting to develop spots of mold. "I don't want Gorhphant to get possessed! I think we can all agree that would not be a pleasant experience for any of us!"
"Don't worry, I've got this," Ariel promised, spreading her tails, Foxfire swirling around her. "Jiruma Magi-"
She was cut off when the ground beneath her feet abruptly split apart, and she very nearly fell into the deep shaft which was suddenly revealed. She yelped as she fell into the pit, managing to grab onto the edge with her forepaws. "Help! HELP!"
"Hang on, I'm on my way!" Takeshi promised, rushing over in Ligerah.
She needn't have bothered. A second later, something rammed into Ariel from behind, hard, flinging her into the air and causing her to crash face first into the skyscraper, embedding her head in the side. "Ow. Usually I'm fine with getting rammed in the rear, but not like this!"
"ARIEL!" Nushi shrieked, turning red.
The object that had just shot out of the shaft rose into the air, twirled about, and unfolded its wings, revealing itself to be a giant red biomechanical avian mecha with FX-01 painted on its side. It had the head of a hawk, the wings and claws of a Condor, and the tail feathers of a peacock spread out majestically behind it. It shrieked, flames igniting all around.
Hebishima's jaw dropped. "That's… That's the Captain's Rider Beast!"
"Hawcondor…" Kazuta rasped weakly.
Parasitica cackled. "But of course! If I control his suit, why shouldn't I be able to control his Rider Beast as well? It may not be a Fungigas, but it's a start!"
X threw up his hands in exasperation. "Fruit Jesus Kazuraba, why do I even bother encrypting anything anymore?! EVERYONE seems to be able to hack my stuff these days!"
"Again, you don't exactly make it hard!" Nushi yelled at him.
Fukiyami cursed. "Wait… Shit! If Parasitica gets control of and manages to infest Hawcondor, then-!"
"She might be able to force the rest of us to combine with her to form FX-Emperor,"a horrified Takeshi realized.
"Or in other words… Instant Fungigas, with the rest of us along for the ride!" Kamiya snarled.
"We can't let that happen! Sorry, Captain, but I'm going to have to take out your bird!" Hebishima declared, launching Stanper at the avian robot.
"Do… What you have to do…" Kazuta gasped.
"Opening fire!" Shin roared, the ShinLiner's weapons firing away at Hawcondor.
Gorhphant launched a rocket fist, Great Kabuto fired his laser, Orcteel sprayed electrified ink, and Goro added his own bullets to the volley, meager as they might be compared to the rest. The massive bombardment streaked towards Hawcondor…
Only for Ptryrann-o to fly into their path, creating an ice shield based around its left hand which weathered the assault. "No! I want to see what happens!" He cried. "An infested suit is one thing, but an infested Rider Beast? Quite another!"
"Oh, come on! You didn't seem too pleased when she tried to infest your robot!" Ariel snapped, struggling to pull her head out of the building.
"Yes, but that's because I'm in here, I'm perfectly fine with her doing it to someone else's robot," X replied.
Parasitica cackled as she exerted her will on the part of Gorhphant she'd successfully infected, forcing its fist open. "While I am grateful for your intercession… If you think I will show you any clemency, think again! Hawcondor, show them your power!"
Hawcondor shrieked and spread its wings, its tail fanning out behind it, all of the eye spots lighting up and gathering power.
"Hawcondor… No…" Kazuta whimpered.
Ignoring its rightful master's pleas, Hawcondor unleashed its power, every one of its oversized feathers launching off of its wings like missiles while the eye spots on the tail fired sweeping laser beams all over the place and an inferno blasted out from its beak. Everyone screamed as explosions blossomed all over the place, Ptryrann-o tumbling away, smoke rising from its back, the ShinLiner crashing into the skyscraper, Gorhphant losing its grip and falling off the building, landing on top of Ligerah, Stanper hitting the ground hard, and Great Kabuto smashing into the force field surrounding the building, nearly knocking Nushi off. Only Orcteel managed to remain clinging to the skyscraper, with Goro holding steady on top of its head…
And that's when he heard a rather large cracking sound. Looking up, he saw that the missile strikes and laser beams slicing through the structure's supports had been the last straw, and King's Tower was starting to crumble. "No!"
"YES!" Parasitica, clinging to the side of the collapsing building, cried triumphantly.
"Wait, I can fix this! Magiine Magiine!" Ariel cast.
Restorative magic began to wash out from her, causing the broken windows to start mending themselves, the zigzagging cracks to begin filling in, the falling pieces of debris to start flying up in reverse…
And then Hawcondor fired missiles at her exposed rear, causing her to cry out and lose her concentration, the magic dissipating and undoing her efforts to repair the building. "Not this time!" Parasitica snarled. "This time, all of you DIE!"
"BRANCH SHADE!"
Parasitica did a double take when Eiji in his Gatakiriba combo crawled out a window and scurried up the building past her… And then another emerged from a different window and scurried past, and another, and another, and another-
And then, before she knew it, a significant portion of the skyscraper was covered in a coating of green OOO clones, the insect-themed Riders joining arms to try and hold the damaged parts together.
"What the-"
She yelped and nearly fell off when suddenly a massive swarm of mechanical grasshoppers flew out of dozens of windows all over the building, the machines covering all the cracks and interlocking to hold them together before they could spread and fracture further.
Down on the ground, Aruto laughed as he guided the Cluster Cells using his Progrise Hopper Blade. "Yeah! Hop to it and cluster together as we metal in Parasitica's plans! And that's how you know it's an Aruto!"
"… WHAT?!" Parasitica screamed.
"Yeah, that's a fairly common reaction," Double admitted as they flew around, using the power of the Heat Gaia Memory in their PrismBicker to weld broken parts of the building back together. "It truly is remarkable how insistent he is in making jokes, even though they're terrible."
"I HEARD THAT!"
"Gah, enough of this!" Parasitica snapped, getting fed up with everything. "Come, Hawcondor! Accept my blessing, so that we may destroy them all together!"
Hawcondor squawked and flew closer, Parasitica leaping out to meet it…
Only for Goro, swinging on his grapnel ("Wrong insect, Goro!" Ariel shouted at him. "You're an ant, not a spider!"), to intercept her with a flying kick, knocking her away. As she fell yet again, shrieking in fury, Goro released his line, spun around, and fired a charged shot into the bird's beak as it prepared to unleash its fire breath on him, causing the flames to explode in its throat and send it flying back.
Orcteel rapidly slithered its way up the side of the building and launched off the side, tackling the dazed Hawcondor and wrapping itself around the bird, binding its wings tight in its coils and tentacles and causing them to fall from the air, shocking it repeatedly with high-voltage bursts.
"We have this!" Fukiyami shouted as Hawcondor shrieked angrily and struggled to break free, scorching the size of its captor with intermittent bursts of flame. "Finish her!"
Goro nodded, spinning around and flinging himself after Parasitica.
She snarled furiously as he drove towards her, pelting her with bullets. "I HAVE HAD JUST ABOUT ENOUGH OF YOU!" She screamed, her centipede tentacles growing stingers from their mouths and lancing out at him like spears as he drew near.
"The feeling is mutual!" Goro yelled back, dodging the first thrust, blasting it as he went by, then grabbed the second out of the air as it shot past him, pulling on it and yanking Parasitica up towards him. He flipped over and delivered a double kick to her sternum, firing energy bullet after energy bullet into her torso. Howling, she swiped at him with her thick club of a left arm, but he flipped over it, firing a blast at her shoulder, then lunged forwards, pinning the limb beneath his body as he started once again punching and shooting his adversary in the face. "Let the captain go, and this all ends!"
"The only thing that's ending is YOU!"
Her right arm lashed out, wrapping itself around his neck and pulling him back. Her left arm slammed into his chest, knocking the breath out of him, and before he could regain it, the centipede tentacles dug their stingers into his back at the same time as the half-formed secondary limbs growing from her sides finally burst free from their tumorous sacs, the small but impossibly sharp claws shooting forwards and burying themselves in his stomach.
Goro choked, spitting up blood which splattered the inside of his helmet, partially covering up the warning displays flashing across his vision. More blood began to seep out from the holes the claws had just punched in his suit, staining the material red.
"GORO!" Everyone screamed in horror.
"I think it's finally time you started falling for me!" Parasitica laughed badly, ripping her claws from Goro's gut, causing more blood to gush out, then flipped around and hurled him downwards with all her might.
Goro fell.
And unfortunately for him, the Plaza surrounding King's Tower did not break his fall, because Parasitica just happened to throw him in the still open shaft Hawcondor had emerged from.
He didn't know how far he fell – the readings on his helmet would have told him, but he was a little too busy bleeding out to focus on them – but it must've been pretty far, because he was pretty sure that if it weren't for his suit, he would've been liquefied the instant he hit the floor of the subterranean mecha hangar. Even so, he was pretty sure he'd broken quite a few bones.
He could hear Formic, screaming at him to get up. He could hear his friends, his teammates, his queen, his children, the entirety of the Hive begging him to do the same.
Before he could get the chance, Parasitica smashed into him with a punch so strong it shook the entire hangar, further cratering the spot where he had landed.
Goro blacked out for a minute. He would later learn that, for a split second, he had actually flatlined.
When his vision returned to him, he was surprised to see that it was at least partially through his own eyes; one of his helmet lenses had broken and the other was badly cracked.
Unfortunately, this did not prevent him from seeing Parasitica looming over him, a foot planted over his (very) broken ribs. "I think I figured out why I hate you," she said coldly. "I've assimilated more of this 'Hino's' memories. Before, I regarded you with contempt – for standing in my way, for siding with my sister – but now I absolutely despise you."
Goro managed a feeble smile. Above, his friends were desperately trying to rush to his aid, but given the struggle to keep Hawcondor contained and X refusing to let them anywhere near the shaft, he didn't think he was going to be getting any help anytime soon.
("Letting her kill him won't net you any scientific breakthroughs!" Nushi shouted, in tears, at X as he blocked another laser blast from Great Kabuto with his ice shield. "Are you really this petty?"
"After all our time together, you really need to ask?" X snarked in reply, firing horn missiles.)
"Oh yeah? Do tell."
"It's because you don't appreciate what you've been given."
Goro blinked. He hadn't expected that. "What do you mean?"
"You and your friends have been given an honor your entire species does not deserve," Parasitica snarled, every syllable dripping with hatred… And was that a trace of bitterness and envy he heard? "Access to the Buzzing, giving you de facto membership to the Hive, one of the greatest civilizations in the universe. You have billions of years of culture, history, knowledge, science, and art at your fingertips. You can review the memories of generations of leaders, sages, heroes, soldiers, artists, scientists, explorers, athletes, and even everyday people who never made a great mark on history but are still preserved for all time in the collective memory of our race. You can speak to people light-years away, people you'll probably never meet face to face, but still know as intimately as your next-door neighbor. You can know someone, really, truly know someone inside and out.
"And what do you do with this great blessing? You whine. You fret and you cry and you wonder, 'Oh, am I really still me? Is my mind really my own? Where do I start and the Buzzing begins? I suddenly feel horribly self-conscious about the fact that I'm sharing all sorts of deep, personal information with trillions of people I've never met even though the majority of my species already does the same thing on fucking social media!'" She suddenly shouted, causing him to flinch.
"That's-"
"Do you have any idea how lucky you are?!" Parasitica ranted, gesticulating angrily. "To be part of something greater than yourself? A whole that is greater than the sum of its parts? A community dedicated to the well-being of all, that wants to make everyone everywhere as safe and happy as they are, a society that is almost utopian, to constantly be swimming in a honeyed ocean of pure, unconditional love, to-" Her voice cracked. "To never be alone again?"
Abruptly, and to the astonishment of Goro and everyone else watching, Parasitica seemed to partially collapse on herself. "I nearly died when my mother severed me from the Buzzing. In the centuries afterwards, there were times I wished I had. That my will was not so strong. That I was not able to withstand the crushing solitude, the absolute silence-" She angrily shook her head. "I'd ask if you knew what it was like, how horrible it is to go from having the voices of an entire civilization in your head to being limited to just one, screaming forever into an endless, uncaring void… But of course you already know what that's like, and, for some unfathomable reason, a part of you wants to go back to that, doesn't it?"
Goro stared at her, stunned. He… Had not been expecting this.
"None of us were," an astonished Apista agreed.
"Holy crap," Ariel murmured.
"I thought I'd found a way out when I discovered the Swarm," Parasitica continued, oddly melancholy. "That I would finally have a community, a kingdom again. But I was wrong. Yes, once again I am networked to countless minds… But they are dead. Rotting. Hollow. In the end, it was still just me. You have no idea how long it took, what I had to do, to make Vespi. And even then, it's still just the two of us, two minds in a vast sea of decay, and the poor thing only knows from my memories that she should have so much more."
Parasitica glanced back down at Goro. "And that's exactly what she'll get. Once I have gotten rid of you and killed my sister, I will be able to usurp control of the Buzzing. Finally, the silence will end. The void will be filled. And maybe, at last, I will finally be whole."
Everyone was stunned by the admission. "Well, damn, I feel kind of bad for her now," Shin confessed.
"That does not excuse a single thing she has done," Mibojin pointed out. "Nor the fact that she brought this upon herself by trying to kill her sister in the first place."
"I know. But still."
"I… I didn't know she felt that way," Apista confessed, ashen. "And all this is because Anthoph chose me instead of her. I still don't know why. I certainly wouldn't have reacted like she did if my sister had been chosen instead… Would I?"
"No way, mom!" Philia proclaimed, with every voice in the Buzzing chiming in. "You're way too good! That's why you got chosen instead of her!"
"I wish I could be so sure…" The queen murmured dubiously.
"How do you know… It'll work out like that?" Goro managed to ask. "That you won't just be making more hollow, empty minds? That you won't still be alone?"
"I don't," Parasitica admitted. "But it must. Or else, all this will have been for nothing."
She leaned closer to him. "Not that any of that will matter to you, because you won't be around to see it. Allow me to give you the distinct honor of being the first of your band of champions to die at my hands. Or rather…"
Her face split apart, the two halves of her helmet shifting sideways to reveal the pale, bruised, worn face of Kazuta. "The hands of your beloved mentor. I think it would be rather poetic for the last thing you see to be the face of the man you care for most choking the life out of you. Goodbye, Goro Aori. Don't worry, Kazuta will join you soon enough."
"Goro… I'm sorry…" Kazuta whispered, tears streaming down his cheeks, a heartbreaking look of abject despair in his eyes as his hands reached down and closed around Goro's throat.
Struggling not to throw up or break down, Kari tore away from the nightmarish image projected in the living room and rushed into the kitchen, where a small package wrapped in spiderwebs was sitting on the table, a note with a spiderweb crest and "Open only in the event of something truly breathtaking" written in Aranea's spidery (ha) handwriting stuck to the front. She frantically ripped the webbing apart with her claws, spurred by the horrific image burned into her retinas and the screams and cries of her terrified children, tore open the box…
And reached, with trembling paws, for the familiar circlet inside.