“Sounds like a story, there. You’ll have to tell it to me. But still, you want something made for the snake? I have to say Valera, that would be a first for me,” the shaper of ore-flesh responded, his brows furrowing in what I thought to be confusion. Though the Coreless’ interactions were still mainly a mystery to me, I thought that I was beginning to get a greater feel for their body language.

A few of them were easy, shared among many of the bad-things that I had seen throughout my life - some even shared with myself. I knew that they bared their fangs to express challenge. I knew that they raised their brows or widened their eyes in surprise or confusion. I knew that they bound themselves in ore-flesh when they felt threatened.

One day, I would know their words, as well. Not now, but some day. I had given up on the idea that the Coreless would learn to speak with my own sibilant hisses; my short time in the many-nest had revealed that the-female-who-was-not-Needle’s failure to hiss was a disability held by the entire species.

As one - and the only one - created by the Great Core, it came down to me to bridge the gap that their failures created.

The-female-who-was-not-Needle bared her teeth, and I tensed slightly. Challenging the shaper of ore-flesh within his own nest was a dangerous endeavor; she had come without her own ore-flesh bindings, while he was surrounded with his creations. Push too hard, and it might mean her death. Where did her confidence come from?

As they often did, the actions of the Coreless left me confused.

“I’d be surprised if you had, Kal. This little cutie’s one of a kind, I think.” She leaned forward, pulling me ahead with the movement of her shoulders and dropping her voice into some sort of malformed hiss. “Can you keep a secret?”

“That depends, I suppose. Why would I need to keep a secret?”

“Well, I don’t want the little guy to get snakenapped. I mean, look at him!” She pointed at me again, then looked back at the shaper. “I mean, even before you get into the secret stuff he’s already adorable. I’d definitely snakenap him, if I had the chance.” He made a strange little noise, exhaling sharply through his nostrils, before baring his own teeth.

“I’ll make sure to keep my mouth shut around any potential snakenappers that aren’t you, then. So, you were saying…”

“He told us the future. That’s how he saved my life,” not-Needle hissed again. It was embarrassing. I think that the shaper thought so too, because his brows rose again in confusion a moment later. I let out a mournful hiss at her ineptitude.

“He told you the future? Wait, the snake can speak?”

“Unfortunately, no. I’m pretty sure that he can’t understand anything we say, either. He can make these ugly illusions, though. That’s -”

Tired of her discordant hissing, I flashed an illusion at the shaper; the same image of removing my bindings that I had shown so many other Coreless today. He was taken aback for a moment, and not-Needle halted in her hissing.

“Those. He’s been doing that all day, I’m surprised that he waited this long to try it on you. Like I said, he really doesn’t like the muzzle.”

“And you’re sure that he can’t understand us? That was odd timing, if nothing else.”

“Like I said, I’m pretty sure.” Not-Needle turned towards me again, dropping her tone slightly and meeting my eyes. “If you move to my other shoulder, I’ll take the muzzle off for a bit.”

Annoyed at being denied again, I flashed a weak light in front of her eyes. She jerked back, uttering something under her breath as the shaper made that same noise with his nostrils again. It lasted longer this time.

“Yeah, I’m almost certain that he can’t understand us. He’s smart for a monster, though. Used those illusions to guide my team safely through the steps of a fight that I don’t think we would have survived, otherwise. Based on some of the things he showed us, we shouldn’t have. We got stuck in a Dungeon unprepared and almost died for it.”

“Huh. Maybe I should take up snakenapping as a hobby,” the shaper said, the words coming out rather dry. His lips twisted up at the corners, a far cry from the bare-fanged challenge that he had displayed earlier. Was he beginning to back down?

“Don’t you dare, Kal! I saw him first.” Not-Needle quickly reached across to scratch my scales, pulling them back again before I remembered to punish her again for the recent betrayal.

The shaper snorted again, turning around and heading to the back of the nest a moment later. Not long after, he returned with a length of thread. Had he been taken by the Aridae, too?

Before I had time to flee, the thread had been wrapped around me. Fortunately, it was removed immediately after. Then wrapped around a different spot. Removed. Another. Removed.

...what was going on? Was he fighting against the Aridae’s commands to capture me in their evil threads? I felt a small amount of respect for the shaper of ore-flesh. He had succeeded where the-female-who-was-not-Needle had failed. Where she had tied the thread around me and bound my fangs, the shaper had seen the error of his ways.

Finally, the shaper stepped back, a thoughtful hum reverberating from the back of his throat. “Shouldn’t be too hard to make something, I think. At the very least, it’ll be a change of pace. Just to be sure, when you say special -”

“Yes, I mean special,” Not-Needle interjected, cutting him off and making some sort of hand motion.

“I’m not sure that I see the point, Valera. Earth-infused protection wouldn’t amount to much at his size. Sure, it would make any bits of armor that he wore harder, but he’d still be crushed as the force smashes against him. His underside would have to be exposed, too. And considering you didn’t bring any Cores back, that’s pretty much all that I have to work with here.”

“That’s what I figured, Kal, don’t worry about it. The thing is, this little guy shed his skin while we were in the Dungeon - and from the way it looks, you might be able to use it. Has that sort of glow to it, you know?”

Not-Needle tossed one of the skin-mouths at her side to the shaper. “Hopefully, you agree. It took some sweet-talking to convince Doran that he should let me take it off his hands.”

“Oh, sweet talking, huh?”

“Shut up, Kal.” Another nostril-heavy exhale for some reason. Another fang-baring challenge. I was completely lost at this point. Considering the constant challenges and threat displays flying in both directions without resulting in any real fight, I was beginning to lean towards this being some form of extended mating ritual - in which case, I would prefer to leave.

The Coreless disgusted me enough, even before anything like that became involved.

Imagine. Coreless - multiplying.

Absolutely disgusting.

Wait. They were the Great Core’s disciple-Coreless and future-disciple-Coreless. A little less disgusting, then. Maybe. I forced back my distaste.

The two jabbered on at one another for a while longer, my dread mounting by the second. As much as I wanted the Great Core’s followers to grow in number, I didn’t want it to happen in front of me. Not like this, at least.

Eventually, the-female-that-was-not-Needle stood up. I regretfully consigned myself to my fate, ready to wash horrible images away from my memory.

Yet, instead of engaging in repulsive Coreless-creation like I thought, she stepped through the moving-wall and back out into the many-nest again.

Odd.

Maybe I didn’t actually understand what was going on.