I have a complaint! said the Wasp Queen.

It woke me up. I'd been on the edge of a nightmare again, one with fire and burning children and Mom and …

Lir was asleep in his mask, snoring through his snout. The Queen was here for me only.

"Thank you, Mama. For waking me."

Your dreams are annoying. They upset me and my children, and also those in your fortification. All of us have them when you have them.

"I'm sorry, I didn't know. How bad is it?"

"Scary dreams. But there's a grim undercurrent: you hate the people you were born into. Those of the Fortress were like that. We learned that there was no point in killing one another until none remained."

"I don't want to kill all the Humans, Mama."

"No? They took your mother when you were small. They did it not just from malice, but also with a kind of pride in being foolish, as near as I can tell."

"That's one way to look at it."

"They died rather than learn, and took your mother with them, even as she tried to save them from death. And when she was gone, they gloated, declared victory over wisdom itself."

I didn't say anything. The Wasp Queen had never been this chatty.

"Your anger is justified. However there are simply no other alternatives. There are no blameless people in the Slice."

"How can you say that? My friends here, the ones who live here on Molly, all of them are great people. The greatest!"

"Individuals. But their own peoples have ugly histories. I'm very, very old. I saw it all firsthand. Fled from it on many occasions."

"Really."

"The one you love, the one you carry on your shoulders? The Hunter People. They fought terrible wars against one another. They never speak of it. They pretend to not remember. It's just less painful."

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I looked at Lir. So silly over there, so comfy.

"The Crying People, now they call themselves Pingsters when speaking to Humans. They used to rage through the caves and jungles of their own world and others, burning their foes with corrosive Magics. Their senses made them inescapable and deadly. They were monstrous, so monstrous that a single great Crying Magician single-handedly found it necessary to change their basic natures. It seems to have worked."

"Humans…tried that. Are trying."

"It's going well, despite your skepticism. Do you think a Human would have brought someone like me to live here in good faith before your Sliceday? Of course not."

"I might have, but I'm weird."

"I doubt it. The Gardeners, those peaceful plant-makers, are the worst offenders. Constantly afraid and physically fragile, they found ways across the Slices and into countless other worlds, exterminating trillions."

The Gardeners? I imagined a searing balloon jihad, spellslinging warriors blazing from the skies in clouds of millions. "What stopped them, Mama?"

"They won. Whatever had made them so afraid, so vengeful, has been completely removed from existence. They are far lesser now, and yet much greater through their kindness."

"How about Amalthea? She's a Kung Fu Crawdad."

"Those people are just assholes."

I thought about this. It sounded pretty wild, and might not have been true, but…"Why tell me?"

"I worry about you. These others you surround yourself with…in many ways their histories are worse than Human. Taking sanctuary among them isn't necessarily a moral act. You…the female one would be your Queen if you let her. The Human. She's good and kind, wiser than you. She suffers and you can help. Will you go to her on your own?"

"I don't know."

"I'm arrogant and nasty, I know, and prideful and cold even among my sisters. Not you. You're prideful about only one thing: you'll never forgive."

That stung, to coin a phrase. I tried to push through it, to be as open with her as she was being with me. "I…know that. I'm like that, I know it."

"There's value in knowing. But…take it from me: love is worthwhile."

I found myself smirking. "Thank you, Mama, but you'll forgive me if I express surprise at you yourself being the one to tell me."

"You and me both. But you helped my children and for that I love you always."

And that appeared to be that; she stopped talking.

"Please shut up," said Lir sleepily.

"Sorry, man." I re-wrapped his blanket and adjusted his mask.

The next day, the Head of the Winnie Council arrived. It wasn't great, if I can hit you with a spoiler.

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