A Bug's Life: The Ant Queen

Chapter 2

Delivering The Bad News

Atta was making her way towards Ant Island with tears pouring down her cheeks. However, before she could fly back to Ant Island, she decided to hide underneath an overhanging thick piece of bark of a log to wait for the rain to settle down, as the rainstorm was quite heavy out there. She sat down with her knees up; after a few moments of silence, she buried her face into her knees and broke down into tears, crying in anguish.

Every blunt word that Flik had said to her before he left were echoing inside of her head; Atta thought that everything he had said to her was true. She was the one who lied to him first and then exiled him from Ant Island for lying to her and the colony, never even bothering to allow him to explain himself on what his true intentions were when he kept the circus bugs a secret from them.

Atta had paid the ultimate price for lying to him, when he left her and the colony, never to return. She wanted to fix this somehow, but how could she? Flik had left, and it was all her fault.

What was she going to tell her colony? She knew that they were now going to expect the hero, who freed them from Hopper's tyranny and abuse, to return with the great news that they would never have to worry about him terrorising them ever again, only to have her deliver the news that not only was Hopper finally defeated, but Flik had abandoned them and she only had herself to blame.

What was her mother, the Queen, going to say about this? Would she be furious? Disappointed? One thing she knew for sure was how Dot, her little sister, was going to react to the news. Not only would she be left heartbroken to learn that Flik, whom she was very fond of and even considered to be her best friend, abandoned her and the colony, Dot would also resent her older sister for lying to him and constantly pushing him away when all he ever wanted was to help, despite causing some accidents with some of his inventions in the past; she would forever blame her for him leaving for those reasons for the rest of her life. The more she ruminated, the more Atta questioned herself on whether she deserved to be queen of the colony or not.

The furious storm seemed to have calmed down a bit, seeing as the rainfall was settling down. Upon noticing this, Atta got up and started walking over to the edge of the river bank, which was nearly filled to the brim with water. She buzzed her sparkling wings and flew towards Ant Island, while dodging some of the raindrops; at that point, Atta's cheeks were warm with dried tears and her eyes were swollen from the crying. She flew for a little bit, before landing on a cliff and ran through the long stems and blades of grass towards the area of the Anthill, and then flew down into the gaping entrance of the Anthill.

As she descended into its dark tunnels, lit with luminescent mushrooms glowing bright blue, Atta eventually made it to the underground chamber where the entire colony was hiding, safely from the rain above ground.

She even spotted the circus bugs, who were recovering after getting themselves untangled from the tree branches; they flew into them while they were pursuing Hopper, who had Flik by the leg in his grasp. "Hey, look! The princess is back!" one of the ants exclaimed in joy. Everyone in the chamber all turned to look at Atta, who was standing at the chamber's opening.

As she glumly approached an elderly-looking purple ant queen, who had a flower with pink petals sitting atop of her head as a crown, and a young pink ant princess, with curly antennas and a freckled face, whose faces were now gleaming with relief, she could hear everyone murmuring questions to one another, "Is she okay?" "What happened?" "Why does she look upset?" They could tell something was wrong with their princess, judging from the fallen look on her face.

"Atta!" Dot cried out happily upon seeing her older sister safe and sound. "Oh thank heavens you're alright," said the relieved Queen, as she approached her daughter and embraced her tightly, to which Atta returned it graciously.

The two ants then stood there, with arms wrapped around each other, for a long moment, before the Queen finally let go of her and began to question Atta rather calmly, "What happened out there? Is Hopper finally gone for good?" "He's... We won't be seeing him again" Atta responded, trying to keep herself together. "Well, where's Flik?" Dot wondered, as she was expecting him to be with Atta, except that he wasn't.

Atta said nothing to that. Instead, her lips began to shake and covered her face with her hands, as she fell to the ground on her knees, sobbing softly to herself. The Queen knew something wasn't right, so she kneeled down to Atta's level and gently put her hands on her shoulders. "Atta, where is Flik?" the Queen asked, as her face intensified with seriousness, while still retaining some sense of composure.

"H-h-he left," stammered Atta, struggling to talk through her silent weeping, "He didn't even want his injuries looked after, he j-j-just left us!" That left the Queen flabbergasted, while Dot stood there stunned, as both couldn't believe what there were hearing.

"But, I don't understand. Why would he leave us? After everything he did to free us from Hopper's abuse?" asked the Queen sincerely, unable to wrap her head around the fact that the ant who desperately wanted to help his colony so bad, who nearly died just to give his colony the courage to finally stand up to Hopper and his gang, after all the years of being bullied, tormented and threatened by them, would suddenly decide to leave the colony.

With her mother's help, Atta slowly got back up on her feet, uncovered her face and wiped the tears off of her warm cheeks, before she could begin explaining why Flik had left them and the colony. "H-h-he left because... B-b-because he was angry with me, w-w-when I told him the truth about w-w-why I really let him go on that s-s-search for warrior bugs," stuttered Atta.

The Queen simply blinked, confused as to what "truth" she was talking about. "I only did it because-" Atta sniffled before going on, "I-I-I only did it, just so that he would've been out of the way, a-a-as we collected food to m-m-meet the double quota before Hopper came back. I didn't think he would've actually returned with help," admitted Atta. "And now, he has abandoned us, and it's all because of me!" Atta cried, as her voice got higher the more she talked.

As soon as she had finished her confession, the Queen had found herself taken aback, shocked by what she had learned. Whereas for Dot, she felt as if her tiny heart had broken in half. After a brief moment of taking in everything that Atta had just spilled out, Dot's expression of disbelief quickly changed to that of anger. "You're right, Atta. Him leaving is your fault!" she exclaimed, angrily. "Dot, please." said the Queen, trying to calm her down, but that proved futile.

"He may have lied to you and the colony, but he only did it to protect you all! He was the only one who was willing to help us be free of those grasshoppers! And what did you do? You threw him away, just to get rid of your "troubles"!" Dot ranted furiously, as her big eyes were starting to well up with small tears. "He was my best friend! He was the only one who understood me! And now he's gone! He abandoned me! And it's all because of you!" She then shrieked to Atta, "I HATE YOU!" before she turned and took off, bawling her eyes out, pushing through everyone in the chamber.

"Dot, wait!" Atta called out to her, as she reached out her hand for her, but Dot had already ran off. All she could do at that point was watch with guilt as her baby sister flew past all the ants, distraught and heartbroken that Flik had abandoned her and the colony. After Dot left the chamber, all the ants were exchanging looks of guilt to one another, feeling ashamed for all the years they had ostracised Flik.

"I have to say, Atta, I'm really disappointed in you," the Queen scolded with her arms folded, which made Atta wince a little, as she turned around to face her. "Not only have you tricked him into believing that he could atone for his past mistakes, but you've also exiled him, told him to never return and hoped that he'd die out there, just so that he wouldn't be an inconvenience to you and the colony anymore, correct?" the Queen inquired with a rather bitter tone. Atta lowered her head in shame, before sighing and giving her a little nod.

The Queen then moved her head, side to side, with a disappointed frown on her face. "You should be ashamed of yourself, Atta," chided the Queen. "I can now see why Flik lied to us all. Us banishing him for it proved to be our gravest mistake, as it nearly cost me my life," the Queen explained with a sorrowful look on her face, looking down at the ground for a brief moment, before lifting it back up towards Atta.

"But you only lied to him, just so that he would've been out of the way," Atta just simply looked down at the ground, feeling heavy with remorse and regret, unsure of what to say. "I'm going to look after Dot now," the Queen sighed in defeat, before deciding to head out of the chamber to look for Dot. "Wait mother, let me help!" Atta suggested in desperation. Her mother briefly stopped in her tracks, looked back at Atta and replied, "I think, you've done enough." That answer had hit Atta right in the feels, as her mother had never been this disappointed in her before.

Atta was left standing there, staring helplessly as her mother left the chamber to find her other daughter. Glancing around her, she studied all the ants present in the chamber, who were all frowning at her. Although Atta couldn't really make out what they whispering to each other, she couldn't help but feel that they must have been talking about how she screwed up really badly, making her cringe.

She then directed her sight onto a group of four ants: one was a tall, dark blue ant, who served as the colony's scholar and schoolteacher, another a plump, freckled, sky blue ant, who was the colony's doctor and carried around a small pink flower to squeeze out a bead of dew to whoever needed it, the other a short, grey ant who had a bit of a temper whenever someone annoyed him, and last a white, elderly ant who was hunched over and had to use a cane to help him walk, due to his old age. Each of them were exchanging looks of shame and guilt, acknowledging that they had really messed up, being the ones who suggested the idea of letting Flik leave to have him out of the way in the first place.

Finally, Atta glimpsed at the circus bugs, who had been watching the entire time and listened to every word that had been said. Even though they were a bit far away, she could tell that none of them were too pleased with her. Although every one of the circus troupe; a fat green caterpillar who loved to eat a lot and wanted to become a butterfly, a slender walking stick who disliked being only seen as a stick, a black-spotted red ladybug who hated being mistaken for a woman, despite his feminine features, pill bug twins who spoke in a language almost no one could understand, an old green praying mantis magician accompanied by a gypsy moth with red wings spotted with yellow circles that resembled eyes, and lastly a beastly rhino beetle with a child-like nature and had a black widow spider as his trainer; all had a slightly different expression, the one feeling that they all shared was disappointment. Atta knew that she really messed things up big time, when even a group of circus performers, all of whom were also Flik's friends, were very cross with her lying to him in the first place.

The Queen was walking down the spiralled pathway of the enormous tree trunk, searching for her young daughter, whilst passing by debarked wood with what looked like primitive drawings of Ant Island itself and stick figures that resembled ants and other bugs, like the grasshoppers. Those primitive drawings served as chronicles of the colony's history; they included the very beginning of how they got to the island and built the Anthill, all the way up to when the grasshoppers first started terrorising and pillaging the ants for their food.

However, there was one primitive drawing that the Queen had passed by unnoticeably, as she was fixated on finding Dot, which depicted a brutal battle between the grasshoppers and a group of hornets, and amongst the latter bugs was a hornet much bigger than the rest, who was fighting the grasshoppers' leader, Hopper himself.

The event that preceded it, however, was the bargain made between the Queen and Hopper; it was agreed that in exchange for the grasshoppers' protection from the hornets and other outside bugs that would've posed a threat, the ants would offer a humongous amount of food to the grasshoppers at the end of each year, just to satisfy their hungry bellies. This agreement had left an important mark in the colony's history, as it was what led to the bloody battle between the grasshoppers and the hornets, which resulted in the hornets' defeat, their banishment and the end of the grasshoppers' incessant ravaging of their island.

Now that the grasshoppers had finally been driven out and their leader now dead, never to bother the ants ever again, what was going to happen from then on? Were those bloodthirsty hornets going to come back for revenge? Or would they have already forgotten about them and moved on elsewhere? Only time would tell...

To be continued...