Chapter 3
Three
A good brownie never tries to stab someone in the face.
Maybe I should read HyattA Good Brownie Does… - Arienna
“Hello, lovelies!” I call out as I poke my head inside my house. “I’m hoooome!” I shimmy through the partially open door, then close it quickly behind me. The last thing I want is for any of my babies to rush past me.
For a moment, there is utter silence.
Then there’s a soft buzzing, coming from the top floor.
A second later, Delilah, one of Hyatt’s sisters, shoots down the spiral staircase at the back of the hall.
I drop to my knees and spread my arms. Her paper-thin wings flap rapidly as she flies right into me.
She knocks me down, and I laugh as her long antennas swipe across my face.
I let her sniff me. She hums in delight as she releases a pleasant smell. Her large beautiful eyes light up with joy at seeing me, and I scratch the top of her furry head with a grin.
Whereas Hyatt is a menace, Delilah is a cuddly boo. If only all of my babies were like her, Fabia would accept them in an instant.
“Where’s your brothers and sisters?” I ask.
She runs her antennas up and down my body, searching for the treats she knows are there. Then she pushes her big head against my trousers. Laughing, I dig out a small round sweet from my pocket. Instantly, the whole house fills with buzzing, like dozens of vibrators going off at once.
The rest of my four babies come flying down the stairs in a brilliant array of colours.
Their thorax ranges from green to blue to yellow, and their abdomen from red to pink to purple.
Their paper-thin wings are a stark contrast, making their fur pop even more, as do their big black eyes and curvy antennas.
I don’t know how anyone could possibly look at these adorable, waist-high wasps, and think they’re monsters.
They land around me as I dig out more sweets. I offer the first one to Hyatt. I didn’t do that the last time, and he killed Kikiko to take his.
Hyatt’s mandibles scrape across my palm as he takes the sugary sweet from me, then he flies into the living room, going through the open door on my right, to eat it in peace.
The next treat goes to Gionova. I didn’t do that the last time either, and she tried to kill me. Granted, she tries to kill me half the time. It’s almost like a game between us.
“Where is my stinger going to go today?” she says.
“Not in my face!” I laugh.
Or anywhere really. The tiniest nick will kill me.
Jack-in-the-box wasps, as I have taken to calling them, are very venomous.
Their stingers are made for paralysing scorpions so they can then inject them with their eggs.
Afterwards, their babies will pop out of the scorpion like fun jack-in-the-boxes, hence their cheerful name.
Delilah finally gets her treat, and she eats it by my feet. Then Bo and Samson, the latest two wasps that’ve hatched, come up to me with a wiggle of their antennas. They’re a bit more cautious around me, not having known me for as long, but Delilah’s close presence helps them to relax.
When the two of them get their treats and go, I scratch Delilah’s head one last time. Leaving her with a pat, I put on my biggest smile and head for Hyatt in my living room.
“Hey, pretty baby,” I say as I creep across the green moss carpet, walking past the coffee table with gouges bitten out of it and the pink three-seater sofa with the missing leg. “I got you some gifts!”
Nibbling on his sweet, he completely ignores me.
Opening the bag of dildos on my shoulder, I pull one out. “Look how pretty this one is!” I beam. Its an Earth echidna’s dick – a smooth tube with what look like four suckers at the end.
He doesn’t even turn his head to look at me.
“Okaaaaay.” I put down the toy and grab the next one. “What about this one?” It’s a beautiful carving of a griffin’s penis – a long, furry schlong. It’s kind of impressive how they managed to make the wood look furry, but at the same time I’m kind of worried about micro-splinters.
When Hyatt pays it no mind, I cautiously rub my palm down it just to sate my curiosity. Thankfully, it’s completely smooth.
I look back at my large wasp. He’s still ignoring me. With a slow exhale, I put the toy down on the floor, trying not to give in to frustration. But he ignores the dragon dildo. The unicorn dildo. The werewolf dildo. Even the kraken one, which sports a Jacob’s ladder.
With nothing left in my bag, I rock back on my heels with a sigh. Hyatt finally looks up at me, and hope builds in my chest. He sniffs the pile of dildos, knocking a few of them aside. My heartbeat increases the longer he pays them attention.
He’s going to do it.
He’s going to do it!
His antennas are rubbing across the unicorn dick, sliding over the thick veins and bulbous head. Excitement curls in my belly as he opens his mouth and –
Yawning, he walks away.
Reminding myself how much I love him, I shove all the dildos back into my bag. I make a note to place them around town tomorrow. Although there’s an orgy tonight, a good brownie never uses sex toys with another. It’s rude to make your partner(s) feel like they’re not good enough to get you off.
Hoisting the bag into the air, I turn around. Then freeze. Hyatt’s mandibles are chewing on the back of my head. Oh no, Fabia is so going to say, “I told you so” at my funeral!
There’s a sharp tug, and I wince as I arch backwards.
My arms flail. I make a little squeak. Delilah comes flying into the room just as he releases me.
I stumble into her lovely, furry body. She nuzzles my face, checking I’m okay, and I throw my arms around her and squeeze. At least one of my babies love –
She bites me.
“Ow!”
As soon as I release her, she flies off. Rubbing my arm, I spin around to look at Hyatt, wondering if he’s about to attack me too. But no. He’s chewing on a wayward stick that must have got stuck in my hair.
“Really?” I say dryly. “I risked your life getting you those dildos, and you want a regular stick?” That isn’t quite a lie. Nature is scary, and if Fabia makes me kick them all out of my house, they’ll probably get eaten by birds and bats.
He emits his happy scent as he starts to tear up the stick.
I shake my head with a smile. At least this means I can start rebuilding my stairs.
Walking over to the sofa I’ve been sleeping on, I search the cushions for the flyer I made last night.
It needs to be perfect before I give it to Fabia in an attempt to sway her from her monster prejudice.
Finding it a bit crumbled, I flatten it out and start reading to see if it’s any good in the light of day.
HERE BE KNOWN:
1. Adult Jack-in-the-box wasps are vegetarians.
2. They are wonderful pollinators, so much so that some flowers even grow to smell like female wasps in order to attract more males.
3. Their stinger is not for killing things or even for hurting them! It’s to paralyse them so they can’t feel the seventy-three squirming babies they inject inside them. So no pain at all!
4. Their babies do eat their way out of the scorpion (food to go, anyone?). Then they punch their way out of its back (hence their name!). But when they do, they moult, and that shedding patches up the holes they leave behind! Isn’t that nice of them?
5. While the baby wasps are cocooning, the scorpion even protects them like a bodyguard because two of the wasp larvae stay in its brain, and they become the best of friends!*
6. I was not forced to write this by a wasp.
*The scorpion does die after the wasps all finish cocooning and leave it. But that’s probably from natural causes rather than the last two larvae eating their way out of its brain.
Pleased with myself, I fold up the flyer so I can put it in my pocket. Perhaps this is the day I convince her that wasps are friends. After all, now that I’ve sorted Hyatt’s bad habit of –
A terrible, familiar noise fills the living room. “Oh no!” I groan as I spin around. “No, no, no, no, no! Bad, boy!”
I rush over to Hyatt as he starts tearing into my coffee table.
But his angry buzz makes me jump back. My eyes widening, I run from the room as he lunges for me, with his stinger leading.
Scrambling across the moss floor, I barely make it out into the hall.
Slamming the door behind me, I stumble away as he bangs into it.
I start to run for the kitchen to get some ambrosia –they love the stuff, and they get adorably sleep when drunk– before remembering he chewed up the stairs. “Ah!” I skid to a stop and drop my head into my hands. “Ugh, I love you, Hyatt. But by the gods, you’re a dick.”
He just slams harder into the door.