We've been inseparable since 2009

Finally, finally, the drone was talking again. It smiled, exposing the little black molars further down its jaws, glinting with spit. "There he-" ICE BEAM!!!

Virosa's face exploded into inky tendrils to block the blast, a beat too late to be considered a clean counter. The extra meat slid off its bottom jaw, hot oil melting the coating. But the tentacles growing from higher up were frozen to its head, blinding it until it managed to rot away. Its mouth was full of the putrid meat. It, shockingly, didn't taste all that bad.

It had taken the arm off Jinyi, the only thing hindering his escape now was the ivy - inert, until Virosa commanded it again. Right now it was choking on its own rotting flesh. It forced words through the gaps as it gagged. "There. He... Is."

It began to wretch, staggering a few steps away, narrow chest heaving. "His name?"

The anvil on his chest finally lifted as Virosa reeled back. Jinyi choked in a gasp of putrid, stinking air. It made his stomach clench and heave, but at least he felt like he could breathe again.

"Gilbert," he spat a random name at it. "Since you want to know so badly." He wasn't paying attention to it, instead throwing everything he had into trying to untangle himself from the vines. They had sunk their tendrils into the joints between his chitin—he tried to manifest some kind of shears to cut himself free, but after a moment of nothing grew frustrated and started just ripping them out by hand. It was slow going without tools, the tangle of vines having been added to by many successive casts of the Valkhound's magic. The pain each handful of ivy torn away brought was like bright sunbursts, waking him up from this nightmare one by one. A clear, viscous fluid oozed from the wounds left behind, but Jinyi didn't care. It was almost satisfying to tear them away roughly, the pain a retribution to his own body and magic for failing him. It was fortunate that he had no real space for tears to well up.

It hacked out the rest of the rancid tissue, breathing out its response on empty lungs. "Gil-?"

Virosa heaved again, forcing air back where there'd been nothing but meat before. "What?" Oil wept from its mouth as the tentacles melted, hitting the floor loud and hard. The plants beneath lapped at it hungrily.

It was forced to think on this for a second, rather than moving to keep the drone trapped. He could escape. It would find him again. This was not the last time. Deciphering the name given was a higher priority.

"She attacks you. She abandons you. She names you... Gilbert. Are you sure... She's your mother? Poor bug. I get more affection... From Rrevalk."

The Valkhound suddenly looked a lot less intimidating like this, hacking up bits of its own tentacles and struggling with nonsensical insults that failed to land altogether. It had made assumption after assumption about Mother, all of which hit so wildly off the mark it was almost amusing. If it hadn't been coming from the same Valkhound who'd just done... all of that. "Sure you do," he replied, making an eye rolling gesture that did nothing to slow the motion of his hands.

He needed to get out of this inane conversation and away from this phlegmy, deadly creature. Permanently. The spike at his chest fell away, replaced by a glassy blade that grew from one arm. Jinyi hacked at the remaining vines holding him, the detangling going much quicker with the help of its cutting edge. Affection from Rrevalk, he thought derisively. He doubted the dripping skeletal creature had so much as attracted a microsecond-long glance from the fate of disorder. Unlike their patron, who had gazed upon them twice, granted them immortality, and addressed Jinyi by name. Cope and seethe, Valkhound.

It swallowed the rest of the refuse down, the sludge sent to its stomach with a strong gulp. It cleared its throat, a sound more akin to the choked noises it'd made when it was struggling to breathe. And now, it'd fully recovered. Wonderful.

Virosa reached for the vines surrounding them one last time. The plants, eager to be led again, traveled quickly where Jinyi stood. They'd twine around his legs, thickening, hindering his escape for a few more seconds.

It sat again, some distance away, studying the gash on its palm. "Before you go... Anymore chips?"

He could almost taste the curl of corrupted magic in the air before it happened. The way its hollow eyes fixed on him, Jinyi knew it was about to pull the same tired, cruel trick it had a hundred times before. Not this time—he would prove that he could be more than a bug, easily squashed with the smallest of efforts.

Shimmering pink-gold wings unfurled from his back just as the inky tendrils began to reach for him again. By now they were the only part of the Drone not covered in some kind of foul black slime. It felt right to have some part of him be clean again. Jinyi leaped into the air out of reach of the vines and turned to the exit without hesitation, though not before calling back to it in a disgusted, 'you were raised by wolves' sort of tone:

"Try learning some manners." The audacity to ask him for more chips after all that. Not unless his life depended on it, and he'd make sure it didn't.

It had more than one trick up its rotten sleeve - if its magic chose to behave this time, again. No hard feelings here, Jinyi (Gilbert) was just excellent for target practice. Big enough to get a real hold on, small enough to keep that hold. The ideal shape!

"But... I was polite!" It called back, the hint of a joke somewhere in its voice and in the crooked way it smiled. They, clearly, had different standards. Driving this point home further-

The soil underneath the thick, stinking flora gurgled with Oil, the only warning Jinyi got before it exploded upward in a lunging flurry of tendrils, sending leaves and petals and dark, sticky fluid flying through the tunnel. One more obstacle to surpass.

"Snacks... For a poor hound... So hungry..."

The laughter was clear in the Valkhound's tone, its veneer of innocent conversation thoroughly shattered by now. Jinyi now knew better than to look back, or even to respond. It was goading him—baiting him. He would not give it what it wanted again.

Oily tentacles exploded from the ground, seizing for the Drone's ankles. He was ready to meet its magic with his own this time, a glassy, sharp blade growing from one leg as he flew. Jinyi kicked out at whatever tendrils reached close enough to be a danger, slicing the grasping limbs to pieces of profaned flesh that would fall to earth and rot away soon enough. He barely slowed down as he did so, continuing on his pink-and-gold beeline out of the tunnel.

The peel of its lip dropped slowly as the drone fluttered out of view, the game over and the fun gone. Oh, well. Back to work again.

It did not have plans to turn Tunnel L into any kind of permanent garden - the plants would wither and die without a stable source of food, water and corruption. Virosa did nothing to hasten this process, personally unbothered by the dark, withered stain it'd left along the length of the tunnel.

Its intestines curled with hunger and the lining of its throat began to crackle. It would finish what it had started, and then it would leave.

It chittered bitterly, as if swearing under its breath. This last growth lacked enthusiasm. Virosa resented the idea that the drone had taken it with him. Distractions from the work. The roots shrivel. You have neglected them.

It shook the thoughts from its head as it attempted to hasten the spell. Virosa was not neglectful. These troublesome doubts seemed to chase it wherever it went, no matter what it did. It would not let them hinder it today.

After a moment of deliberation, it chose to travel back towards Canis. It had had its fill of The Hive.