In the morning, I set out to find Khapra. I assume that she's in the Jewel hive marketplace. I go to my small little vendor and wait. Maybe she would come again. Maybe not. After all, it's a little early for a HiveWing to be up. Six in the morning? HiveWings around here probably wake up no later than ten. I reached out in the darkness and touched scales. HiveWing scales. I recoiled at the touch. "Sorry, sorry," I frantically say. "I didn't see you there."

"Me neither," the HiveWing says. She shakes, trying to contain her laughter. I feel myself, realizing my antennae are perked straight up. I try to wind them around my horns, but they just refuse, rebelling with curiosity. The HiveWing continues. "You're the one I met at the marketplace, aren't you?"

"Khapra?" I burst out. Immediately I regret it. How's she going to react? What if she wasn't Khapra, and just a clumsy HiveWing?

"How do you know my name?" Khapra asked.

"Oh." I'm relieved. A more calm reaction rather than one, say, Lachia might have. ("Waaait a minute. WHO ARE YOU? HOW do you know me when I DON'T EVEN KNOW WHO YOU ARE? Are you SPYING ON ME! OR STALKING ME WITHOUT MY PERMISSION? Only my friends can stalk me. You. Are NOT MY FRIEND SO PREPARE TO DIE.")

"I heard somebody with you say your name as you are leaving."

"Oh, Lasius? He's my older brother. Mostly he just follows me everywhere, just because I'm blind. Just because I can't see doesn't mean I can't fend for myself." Alright, that's just off. HiveWings get all this special care and pity for the very same things that SilkWings would be seen as "incompetent" or "needy" for. But it isn't exactly her fault. It's everyone else's. The Hive leaders. Society. Queen Wasp. Khapra breaks the silence. "You're upset."

"No."

"What is it?"

"It doesn't sound like Lasius is here. Doesn't he have an attachment to you or something?" That makes Khapra laugh. "Ick, no. He's kind of annoying, if you ask me. Yeah, I snuck off."

"And he wasn't, like, awake or anything?"

"Nope. One of his friends invited him over to a party last night. Didn't come back until midnight. He was snoring away when I left." Now it's my turn to laugh. "You're starting to make me wonder. How did you become blind in the first place?" I hear Khapra tap her claw tips on the ground, as if to reorient herself. Great minds think alike, I guess.

"Oh, I was just born this way. You?" I realise she didn't mean to say "You?" at the end. Before she could take it back, I jump in. "So you know how SilkWings get branded on their palm after they hatch?"

"Yeah?" Khapra sounds uncertain.

"They use fire for that. And the HiveWings who do that weren't doing it properly." I let her touch the scar on my shoulder.

"And then burned by searing hot metal on the head. Yeah. My eyes work, but my brain doesn't." Silence.

"Um," Khapra says, hesitating to go further. "Is it alright if I buy an apple?"

"Sure." I reach for the wall to direct myself. I'm not sure how to tell her about Metamorphosis. "My stand is this way. I'm going to give it back to my dad soon. He needs it more than I do, after all." Gosh, I'm horrible at talking in general. "Don't bother to become direly attached to me. I'll probably be shipped off to work in another Hive in about a week. No choice. I wish the LeafWings are still alive."

"Oh, they are," Khapra says. "My dad was talking about it the other day. He saw one talking to a SilkWing about something, but he chose not to tell anybody. Except for me."

"What?! What're they like?"

"They're sort of like tree dragons with two leaves for wings. Pretty cool, by the sound of it. He said something about how they can grow plants really fast."

"Huh. Cool. We're here." I touch the little stand. "One apple, incoming.'' I grab a tiny little apple from my little satchel I wear on my shoulder. I place the little apple in Khapra's talon. "Here, I guess." I place my talon in a little compartment for the scales I need to get breakfast and a metamorphosis day present for my twin sister. Ten scales. That's certainly enough. "I have to go," I say. I'm not selling today, for obvious reasons. "You can take all of the leftover stand things I've been selling." I reach for Khapra's talon and thrust the bag there. I have work to do.

"Going so soon?" Khapra asked.

"I have to," I say. "My sister and I have metamorphosis today." I turn to leave, in a direction I know has no walls.

I don't have eyesight, but my antennae are very powerful. Just a swat in the air and I know where everything in a ten foot radius would be. Sadly, HiveWings couldn't do that. I took a step, and another. Walking soon comes easy. I find my way back to the webs my dad's in. "Dad?" I ask.

"Yeah?"

"Lachia's not here. Where is she?"

"Oh. She went to get breakfast. I think she's at that store down the street."

"Okay. Bye." I head in the direction of the shop Lachia loved. I stop to set down my pouch with food, and continue on my way. I take along the one with scales to buy supplies to make a gift for my new friend Khapra.

Something for her to remember me by.