Quite The Mockery!

Human nature is to use, and abuse, to destroy, and employ, so it's no great wonder when Sophodra is forced to face quite the mockery of something she’s very familiar with.

Sophodra wasn’t having a particularly interesting day, the job she had been hired for was so small and uninteresting it didn’t warrant convincing Rose to join. She had already caught somewhere around seven to twelve humans, but these ones acted a little… off somehow, they didn’t quite seem afraid. Oh don’t get her wrong, they tried all they could to escape, traps and weapons included, but being barely six feet tall hampered that a bit. But they were so… so… uncaring, nonchalant, unafraid, she mosied forwards deeper into the tunnels, trying to find the central nest.

Several more came into her scent range, moving in a cyclical fashion, bringing, dropping, grabbing, bringing, dropping, grabbing- and etc etc. They put up an oddly average fight, kicking and running, even just getting between the flytrap teeth to wiggle out, if they had clamped down on them that is. She didn’t know why this was so- unsettling, normally they were inventive, and who wouldn’t if they believed they would be eaten?

Sophodra exhaled from her spiracles in exasperation, she didn’t need to overthink this, maybe these ones were just… really stupid? They were also oddly heavy, and absolutely covered in little metal tools, like, excessively , weirder yet that they didn’t use them against her. She continued following the trails of structuring, little bits of metal adorning everything in sight, very haphazard even for a nest of human design.

She snagged a few running around above her with a simple hop, her venus flytraps hastily catching them and retracting back to tuck them away. But strangest of all, they never ran towards small crevices, cracks and holes they could hide, always in the same direction… deeper. It was strange, maybe there was something that she couldn’t remove them from? A crystallized ball of amber they had hollowed out?

It was peculiar, but that only made Sophodra more interested, she was determined to know and learn all she could of humans, and what they truly were. She also thought that they were… cute? That's not the right word- visually pleasing? Sure, close enough, something about their soft symmetry was just interesting to her. Probably because she quite literally studied them for her job, and held an immense fascination and respect for the numerous species. Except chickens, don’t ask, she took pride in her somewhat unconventional- removal methods, especially with the lack of… certain practices.

She finally found what she could only assume to be the center of the nest, absolutely piled with metal and other things humans loved to hoard. Ah! There seemed to be a large mass of humans in the center, all surrounding a single- oh, that's not normal at all , in the center was a panicked human. They were obviously female, and absolutely surrounded by other members of her species, Sophodra wasted no time in removing them with her tarsus. Gently picking them up by the scruff of their cloak and away from the angry horde, who seemed all too willing to kill their fellow human.

And then she noticed something, a powerful stench, just above her, as if an entire colony of humans had crawled into an egg and died.  And then she looked up, and I don’t think Sophodra or the little human in her graspers will ever forget what they saw next. Suspended by its own limbs is something Sophodra could only describe as a mockery, a twisted perversion of human biology and appearance. Its eyes were replaced with glowing sockets, flickering as it stared at her, its chest was covered in a massive chassis of metal and unidentifiable plants. Its arms were far longer than that of a natural human being, lanky and almost floppy, unrestrained by normal internal chitin. It loomed over her, smaller still even with its unnatural size, but nonetheless terrifying and primal, triggering every flight or fight response in the mantis.

Its mouth was agape with massive teeth, and if she looked close enough, she could see Humans walking inside, working on its internals. Like engineers, but with something alive a mocker of their own kin as a tool something she doubted even Ants would do. Its legs were not spared from the unnatural transformation, the lower half replaced entirely with two massive protrusions of internal chitin. Bending mechanically in the middle, like some crude attempt at using the internal chitin for something it was not designed to do. Patches and stitches covered the beast as it groaned in a low unnatural manner, too slow and drawn out to be the work of a bio-machine.

Sophodra was still, absolutely dead still, there was nothing in her mind that was making even a single peep, just pure primal confusion. Her antennae flattened against her head as she looked in confused fear, a fear not caused by fear of death, but by that of a terrifying unknown. And she stayed still, until it lunged , not jumped not leapt not dropped, lunged , it threw itself at her with all its disgusting blighted might. She leapt forwards so that it would miss and land behind her, working mostly on instinct and fear than any real reasoning.

She twisted around to gaze at the abomination, as it as well turned, but then it did something strange, it made a sound, but worst of all wasn’t the sound. It was what accompanied that sound as it was made, a very specific pheromone, one universal to all Macrovolutes.

“DIE” it was vague, so vague in fact she doubted that was the specific meaning it had meant to convey, but it was understood nonetheless. It lunged once more, outstretching its disgusting floppy limbs like horrific centipedes, trying to find purchase upon her carapace as she swatted at them. Slice after slice, no matter the damage its limbs sustained, it just kept getting closer, until finally, she managed to have dealt enough damage to rip off its hand. It lunged backwards, growling in a way no vertebrate or invertebrate could as blood flowed from its gaping wound, even then it did not show fear. 

Not even movement betrayed fear, more surprise than any real fear, Sophodra empowered by The Macrovolute equivalent to adrenaline, attacked first. She lunged and found purchase on its jaw with her unoccupied raptorial leg, ripping off the bottom layer of flesh from the abomination. Several engineers fell out from its jaw, as it desperately tried to catch them and return them to the safety of its innards, Sophodra struck it once more.

And then again, and again, and again, and many many more times, flesh and blood flew as it growled and bit her, trying to puncture her chitin. But eventually its body moved no more, the precious lifeblood of its horrendous biomachinery lost in vast quantities caused it to still. She watched in abstract horror as several humans skittered away from the corpse, crawling away from wounds and holes in the metallic shell.

Sophodra would never admit to how fast she ran away, not for any reason of embarrassment, but because she never wanted to acknowledge that ever again. She gently looked down towards her occupied tarsus, the human in it was shaking and making sounds very loudly . It didn’t take a vertebratologist to know they were terrified, and well… that just wouldn’t do right? Surely others would complain about the noise.

Yes, there was no other reason she held the human to her chest, chittered words of comfort that weren’t understood, while gently running her tarsus over comfortingly. She definitely wasn’t doing this because she thought that the human was fully capable of understanding how horrifying that was, and shared her fear. She definitely didn’t shake herself, comforted only slightly by the empathy that comes from a shared traumatic experience. And the compassionate gesture that the human reciprocated, hugging her tarsus tightly like an old friend she hadn’t seen in years.

Nope, in fact, none of that happened, which is why she told rose nothing of the experience that just happened, because it never did.

She thinks she’ll call the human, the one she has a normal fascination and attachment to… Honey, just because she was thinking of it, no other reason.