Selected Scenes from the Ecologies of the Labyrinth

As the present fight within the present subterranean enclosure goes on, a seemingly incidental transfer takes place, with fresh spores drifting into microscopic networks of filaments within the indigenous colonies of gray symbionts-the mycological equivalent of news and visitors from distant lands. Invigorated, the native goop generates exciting new spores for the imported goop to take with it if it should be lucky enough to leave again. Bit by bit the vigor and diversity of the gray stuff in each of its sunless colonies is improving, although it has nothing like a human consciousness, merely a set of tools that has served it well.

“YEAH!” Sethrys screams. Her blade cuts into something not like skin, splashing something not like blood. The weird, crouching things are summoning reinforcements. The odds against the adventurers are growing. Still, Sethrys’s self-confidence feels like an inner sunlight that refuses to dim. Her friends are equally optimistic, bright-eyed in the exhilaration of combat. It’s wild, she thinks as they form a wall against the coming onslaught. She ought to be exhausted, but as usual she feels like she could do this all day. Couldn’t they all just do this all day?

X

Up above, the sky is a sun-washed silken blue that deepens into forever and the bees are going from blossom to blossom while life is warm. Yellow grains dust their bodies.