I set out on my way, knowing from Tigger that the forest extended for eight miles, cut through with streams and peppered with lakes, until reaching the summit of a buried Brumallian hive city. Moving into the shade of the trees, I noticed blue fungal spears piercing up through the ground cover, and began to hear the sounds of the forest: a weird chittering, something burping distantly, and a thwocking sound that could have been made by a woodpecker. To me the air still smelt of bleach, but with an additional slight undertone on the borderline between putridity and the smell of a rose—an odd combination. A few hundred feet into the forest I spotted one of the creatures making the thwocking sound: a large insectoid thing with a rectangular body, sprouting jointed legs at each corner. It clung to one of the tree bulbs, vibrating on the spot to emit that sound, and, as I passed, it extracted its tubular snout from a hole in the side of the bulb, turned its bird-like head towards me for a moment, then dismissively returned to its work.

As I trudged along I began to feel tired, and again hungry, so perhaps it would have been better had the drone dropped me closer to the hive city, but I needed time to think about recent events, and my response to them. I wanted to make my personal assessment of the Brumallians here, communicate with their ruling body—the Consensus—concerning their future course, for what the Polity achieved here depended upon them as well. After that I needed to get myself to Sudoria, intact. I could not use Tigger, since Fleet would pounce on that as proof of my having imported Polity technology. I would probably be unable to avoid the show trial Fleet was planning for me, but it being a media event, there might not be any overt attempts on my life, though the Fleet commanders would certainly try to keep me under tight control. Wondering how I might slip away from them, I did not notice the figure watching me until it emitted that same odd cluttering sound I had heard earlier.

I stared across the intervening twenty yards at a squatting humanoid figure. Its skin was mottled dark green, black and creamy white and bore a chequered texture as if a net had been drawn over it tightly. Its hands were shaped little different from my own, but a spur thumb sprouted from the juncture of wrist and palm on the opposite side from its normal thumb, and another sprouted at the elbow, lying flat against its forearm. The creature's long neck extended forward, and connected to the skull in such a way that if it had risen vertically from the body, as with most humans, those wide total-green eyes would have been staring up at the sky. It possessed no nose and its face jutted forward at the bottom, terminating in saw-toothed mandibles that vibrated before its hard-looking mouth. It wore dungarees cut off at the knee, and sandals, and metallic rings adorned the extended neck. A Brumallian.

While continuing towards it, I raised my hand in greeting and then signed the query, "Correct course to the city?" gesturing ahead. The Brumallian language consists of a lot more than hand signing. There are numerous clicks, pops and sawing sounds I could not produce unaided, since I lacked their mandibles.

The Brumallian first stood there, eyes growing wider, then made a sound similar to that of a brick being thrown into a bush. Though I could not myself make similar sounds, I did recognise their meaning: "What the fuck are you?"

I now tentatively identified this one as a female. Duras and his associates had transmitted holocordings to Geronamid. I had spent many hours studying them so that I could more fully comprehend Brumallian society and better recognise its components. I supposed my initial difficulty in identifying her sex might be due to her being just an adolescent.

"I'm a friend," I signed. "I am a Consul from the Polity." Believe me, conveying that last bit made the joints in my fingers crunch. I then wondered if I'd got it wrong when abruptly she turned, dropping down on all fours, and hurtled away with a lizard-like gait. Maybe I'd unwittingly said something obscene or threatening. Then I reconsidered: perhaps from a distance she had mistaken me for a Sudorian, but as I drew closer my lack of a breather mask and sheer size must have become more evident. Being accustomed to living in hive-like conditions, Brumallians were probably a touch xenophobic—much preferring to face anything alien and new with plenty of their fellows around them.

I trudged on, and within an hour I reached a treeless area spanning both sides of a wide, slow-moving river. Here the soft ground showed a multitude of trails cut between spongy masses of growths resembling huge chanterelle mushrooms. These, standing waist-high to me, were coloured slick green on top and urine yellow underneath. I thumped the edge of one in passing and the whole mass of it vibrated, sending black crab-things the size of marbles scurrying out from their boreholes in it. I quickly discovered that I could not approach the river here since, after moving a few yards out on this soft ground, I began to sink. The closest I did manage to approach was by climbing up onto the mushroom growths and using them as stepping stones. However, upon reaching the ones nearest to the river, I saw that ten feet of glistening mud still lay between me and the water.

Then there was the murky water itself. Masses of weed like green caviar floated on the surface, things like black commas as big as fists shoaled everywhere, and quadruped insectoids, seemingly fashioned out of iron pipes and barbed wire, stepped from weed mass to weed mass. One of these, pausing too long astride a gap over the water, helped remind me that other creatures resided here too when a great yellow mouth engulfed it. The worm body of its owner then turned in the water like an ATV tyre, before disappearing with a final cocky flip of its meaty tail. I quickly returned to seek firmer ground.

Remembering how the Brumallian girl had fled over to my right, I turned in that direction in the hope of finding a river crossing point. Soon I came upon a trail worn deep into the ground and there turned back towards the river again. I don't know why I expected to find a bridge, since on Brumal it made perfect sense to instead find a tunnel burrowing underneath the river.

The oval brick-lined pipe speared down into the ground at forty-five degrees, its arched entrance poking up from the soft earth like the end of a Victorian sewer. The smell exuding from it reminded me of a damp shower cubicle recently scoured and disinfected by a Cleanbot. Leaning against the arch I peered inside. At first I assumed it utterly lightless down there, but as my eyes grew more accustomed to the gloom I discerned a pale blue glow, so I entered.

Just beyond the entrance, a series of steps led down, and there were hand grips grooved into the brickwork of the walls. As daylight began to grow dim behind me, I came upon the first of the overhead lighting units: a blue ovoid hanging from the ceiling attached to ornate black ironwork. Only when it shifted and repositioned itself did I realise my mistake, and now recognise the light itself as the body sac of a large tic, the black 'ironwork' comprising its thorax, legs and feeding head. I wondered what it fed on, and decided not to linger there in case I found out. Belatedly, as I moved on, I realised that what I had just seen was a biolight—a product of genetic manipulation, not nature.

Where the steps ended I was forced to wade on through about a foot of water. From somewhere nearby came a sloppy rhythmic sound, as of dinosaurs mating. Some kind of pump was preventing this tunnel from flooding, but after seeing that biolight I wasn't sure I wanted to meet this particular pump. To my surprise, at a point I estimated to lie directly under the midpoint of the river, I crossed a much wider tunnel that seemed to follow the river's course. Had I now reached the hive city's suburbs? I briefly considered turning left or right, but decided it would be better if I continued on towards the city overland, arriving in full view of lots of inhabitants. Judging by the reaction of the girl earlier, I didn't want to come unexpectedly upon any Brumallians down here—no telling how they might react. Another flight of steps came into sight ahead, and thankfully I ascended them. Once out of the water, my boots promptly disintegrated on my feet. As I stopped to kick off their soggy remains, I also noted long rips and spreading patches of yellow now decorating my clothing, and surmised that it would not be long before that fell apart too.