Solant felt as if her mind was balanced on a mandible’s edge. She saw everything that occurred and her mind catalogued every event, filing them, ordering them, and then she responded to each in turn as best she could.
Minute by minute, her four groups rotated through, regardless of the conditions at the front. The ravenous, unthinking beasts of the wave weren’t watching or analysing their movements, and so didn’t anticipate or take advantage of the minute openings in her tidy formation the manoeuvre created, as a disciplined and thinking opponent would.
Adjust the tactics to suit the opponent. There was no such thing as a universal strategy.
Another of her idioms.
The monsters of the wave were crazed, desperate and savage, throwing themselves against her defensive position over and over again. Many times, she was forced to give ground, only to claw it back later.
Fortunately, she didn’t have to employ her new move until the troops had settled into a good rhythm.
From around the corner, Solant spotted a new threat approaching: a shimmering turtle, almost the same size as the Eldest, glimmering with energy that rolled from it in waves. Her front line was currently occupied with a pack of ape-like creatures that could summon clouds to obscure their bodies and even phase themselves into the mist.
“Hard push,” she ordered, “starting in ten seconds.”
The energy and mana available to her troops was a resource that had to be carefully managed, but she ordered them to spend it. Ten seconds later, a barrage of fire burned away the cloud and apes alike, allowing the soldiers to latch onto the struggling monsters and bring them down.
“Rotate,” she ordered, not missing a beat and allowing her formation the few seconds necessary to switch. “Forward.”
Huddled just behind the front line of soldiers, she had a good view of the monsters approaching down the tunnel, and at this moment, the giant turtle was the only thing coming. She wanted a little extra room to work with as they engaged the beast.
“Tea and biscuits in ten seconds.”
A moment of hesitation rippled through the troops, a result of their lack of familiarity with the tactic. The ants began to respond, urged by her broodmates amongst their ranks, and Solant picked up the slack, issuing incisive orders.
The turtle represented exactly the kind of opponent the Colony was struggling with in the fourth. Too tough for them to bring down efficiently, resulting in their lines being pushed in, the troops exhausted and vulnerable to whatever came next.
Having them fruitlessly flail against the Eldest’s undefeatable carapace while everyone else poured on damage was one option, but was probably the least effective use of that particular individual's talents. Tea and biscuits was a new attempt at implementing an old strategy.
Each second that passed, the monster loomed closer and Solant prepared to engage her stratagem. The turtle crashed closer… closer still!
“Now!” she snapped.
Several things happened at once. The front line drew back, while two scouts slid in behind her and seized hold of her back legs. Once she felt that contact, Solant threw herself forward and rotated to land on her back.
“Oh no!” she cried, though it was unlikely the turtle could smell pheromones. “It’s a disaster!”
Then she waggled her four free legs helplessly.
Not many ants had enjoyed successive special evolutions as she had. In fact, vanishingly few had that privilege compared to the enormous numbers of the Colony. Could she compare to the delicious ten course meal that the Eldest represented?
Not even remotely. But she was, at the very least, a delectable snack. Tea and biscuits.
Enraged and unthinking, the turtle lunged for her, its hooked maw open wide, but the scouts dashed away like lightning, dragging the general with them. Of course, they didn’t go too far.
Solant remained, waggling her legs helplessly, just out of the monster’s reach.
Furious at being denied, the turtle pushed itself up again and rumbled forward, its jaws gnashing with hunger and rage. The scouts kept Solant just out of reach as they lured the turtle deeper and deeper.
And then the trap was sprung.
While being focused on the helpless little treat in front of it, the monster had been lured deep into the ant formation and was now surrounded on all sides.
“Attack!” Solant ordered.
Three quarters of her force descended on the beast, striking at its flanks, its tail, from underneath and above while the last division once again sealed the tunnel and defended it from whatever may come next. With only twenty-five percent of their force dedicated to holding the tunnel, the ants knew they were in a race against the clock to defeat the turtle and so threw everything they had at it, reserving nothing in an effort to bring it down.
Solant watched with satisfaction as it eventually fell. Fighting it head-on would have been difficult, to say the least, exhausting her forces. Since these maddened monsters were so easy to deceive, it seemed a waste to fail to take advantage of it, luring them into even more unfavoured ground than they were in already.
It wasn’t as if the plan was without risks, but it could certainly be changed to add layers of safety. It wasn’t even necessary to dangle an ant as bait, as she had done. With some time and preparation, a sufficiently large core could be used to lure the beasts deeper into the ant nest where they could be crushed from all sides.
“Reform the line!” Solant demanded. “The formation must be established in ten seconds! Go!”
As the frontline held on, the rest of the army scrambled to fall in behind them, and soon enough, they resumed their rotations, the little general managing the entire field of battle like clockwork.
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