The distant flickering of wings and the rapid tap tap tap of the Empress's tarsal claws against the polished bedrock floor echoed through the lonesome palace corridor, hundreds of feet below the leathered, sandblasted surface of Titania, second planet of the Lylat System. The light of the lantern grasped firmly in her slender fingers danced across the thousands of ommatidia that made up her compound eyes.
Breathe, Brinn, she thought to herself. She allowed the muscles around the spiracles on her thorax to relax. It was quiet down here - she thanked the goras, the Life Givers, that she was deep enough that the screams and wailing in the upper tunnels could not penetrate.
Everything was different now. The emptiness inside grew so vast that the powerful emotions exploding within her - immense confusion, intense anger, everlasting hopelessness - almost didn't even register. She was numb.
To think, only a month prior, Titania was on the cusp of a grand resurgence.
A small electronic device vibrated inside her head. A voice came from within the hive.
"Commander," came a chatter, "We can confirm the militants have retreated."
Brinn detected a suppressed sob in the lieutenant's message.
"Leave one-tenth of your force at the stem surface base," Brinn communicated back, a low, somber chirping. "The rest retreat. Regroup and be prepared to launch before the end of this lunar day."
The electronic device went quiet.
It was war, and Brinn was in charge. The notion was almost laughable. If it weren't so painfully, gutwrenchingly serious, Brinn might've laughed.
It hadn't even been a month since the coronation. And in that month, the whole world changed.
It started with the apes. On the very day Brinn was to receive her crown, a visitor arrived in the Lands Above. A grotesque of a man, massive in size, his ego only barely managing to exceed the size of his head. The ape scientist, Dr. Andross. From the safety of the tunnels, Brinn's people watched as the ape committed acts of vile sorcery upon the heat-scarred surface of Titania.
But then, glorious creator - a goras was born.
Andross, through means unknown, resurrected the goras - the Life Giver.
In ancient times, the goras roamed freely upon the surface of Titania, and brought with them a fountain of life. The soil seemed to invigorate beneath their feet; miles upon miles of forest and woodlands could be used to trace the migratory patterns of the goras across the old civilizations. But they, like the rest of the planet, died long ago.
To see one with her very eyes - and in such short a time after becoming empress - she could not believe it. Her fears about leadership all washed away at the hope of this goras, of a reborn Titanian surface, of service to this biological abomination dredged from the annals of history by Dr. Andross. She would preside over the new birth of a solar empire - and the goras, and this doctor, were the key.
She could see it - thousands of years in the future, temples and statues dedicated to her reign. Empress Brinn II of Titania - the savior of her kind.
Her fitful sleeps full of dreams turned to fantasies of eternal grandeur, of a home atop a lake - a real one, not the ponds of water that filtered through the catacombs.
Gone, the thought pierced her brain. All gone. I hadn't even a taste.
Angry tears cascaded down her hairy carapace.
Who had done this? Who had murdered the newborn god so callously, mere days upon its birth? Who deigned to commit this future genocide upon Titania?
Brinn approached a door at the side of the corridor and pushed it open, the old wood catching slightly in the frame. On the other side was a moderately-sized spherical chamber, dotted with thousands of holes - tunnels - that snaked throughout the colony. Whatever the empress said in this room would echo throughout the colony - it was time to address the empire. No doubt the rumors had already spread to every living Titanian under the surface - she needed to take control of the narrative with haste.
"Citizens of Titania," she spoke clearly, her mandibles flexing with purpose. All ears would be on her. "On this day, our newborn god was mercilessly attacked by fighters with the Cornerian Federation. The victims - the millions, upon millions, of our brood who will not live as a result of this blasphemous attack, cry across history for us to act."
War, she thought to herself. War upon the sky.
"The corpse of the goras lay rotting in the sun at the door to our world. That image of its final breath has filled us with disbelief, deep sadness, and a massive anger. This act of ruin upon us is taken as an act of war, and we, the people of Titania, will respond in kind."
Up until this moment, Brinn had trouble picturing herself as empress. And now - it made even less sense.
Only a month ago, the most important thing Brinn had to take care of was choosing curtains for the library. Not a war.
"Today, our people saw evil - the very heart of it. The Cornerians have committed a genocide of our hopes and our future. This attack on our people cannot go unanswered. The answer is war - the target, Corneria City."
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