rejectomorph (flying_blind) wrote,
rejectomorph
flying_blind

Bugged

The wings emitted a faint hum as the dark insect glided in leisurely flight. It landed on the jamb of the front door, and I was able to examine it closely. It as about a quarter of an inch long, its chitinous outer wings shiny and black, now folded protectively over its fragile, transparent inner wings, only a small portion of which were revealed. The segmented head was like a delicate amber carving, with two big eye-pods of black jade affixed to the sides. Its fine antenna quivered and waved as the bug crawled up the jamb on six thin legs.

From the face, two moderately long stalks extended- part of its feeding apparatus, I believe- and between them were two shorter protrusions, like extended twin tongues. The longer stalks moved over the surface of the wood, gathering something which I could not see and moving it to the shorter protuberances. Though I was but a few inches distant, and the comparatively huge clusters of eyes must have revealed me to the bug, it ignored me and continued its dinner, scouring the surface of the wood for what may have been bits of pollen which had settled there- I really have no idea. After a while, the black outer wings suddenly opened and the insect arose from the door jamb and flew off to be lost in the afternoon sunlight, apparently none the worse for the experience of having been watched by a gigantic voyeur.

My oddly alien fellow denizen of the planet having departed, I stood for a while observing the day, with its silvery cloud clusters and bright sunshine, and enjoyed the mild air, which was filled with countless other small winged creatures flitting and flashing from place to place. The moment had become remarkably dense with activity, and the garden was suddenly like a bucolic version of a teeming city street, almost dizzying in its complexity. Had the sound of the afternoon breeze not been so loud, I imagine that I might have heard the hum of those thousands of tiny, beating wings.

They are probably silent now. The sun has set and the clouds grown dark, and the air grows night-chill again. But perhaps the bugs are only hidden by the darkness. Maybe they continue their activity, and the night is as busy as the day. Maybe, if the air falls perfectly still, and I listen carefully, I'll hear that collective hum which I have imagined.
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