Elated Alate

     I stood there dumbstruck, not sure how I should respond. I couldn’t see, but I could sense his shape vaguely: an upright-standing ant with four arms, two legs, wings, and a stinger. It was actually strange how normal he seemed, not scaled or horned or disfigured like other demons, just a big ant that stood upright.

“’Ey!” He spoke again, “You ignoring me?!”

“Ah, n-no, sorry. Sure, you can come aboard.”

     “Excellente!” He exclaimed, leaping from the corpse he sat upon and landing onto the boat, rocking it as he did. Up close and with his hunched-over posture, he was a bit shorter than me, the height of his head around my nose, but his antennae gave him much more height. He was quick to shuffle around me, waving those antennae in my directions.

“Hm hm hm hm! What a weird guy! You smell like four demons! Hm! And something else? Hm! Plants! Haven’t smell those in awhile! And! Hm! Hm?!?”

     He gripped my jaw and pulled my mouth open, tapping his antennae near my mouth, almost going in.

“Is this...steak?! And fruit!?! Where?! Where did you get steak and fruit?!?”

I found it hard to speak with him grabbing my jaw. He had a surprisingly strong grip! “Iahuhfwenuh!” I gripped his claw and pulled it from my jaw, “I have a friend that made food for me. But you know what st-”

“Where?!? I want steak and fruit too!!”

     Silently, I pointed my finger upward, which it seemed he was able to see even in the darkness.

“Aw, up there? Do you have a way back up there?”

“Nope. I’m currently looking for one.”

“Aw shit! Me too! I guess that means we’re both stuck down here.”

“Yeah, but...you know what steak is? Have you been to a human world? The other demons I’ve met don’t know much about food or care for it.”

“’Course! I’m from a human world! Well, calling it a ‘human’ world ain’t right. Way I heard it, there were WAY more ants on there. Shoulda been an ant world! Anyway, I was a regular ol’ ant before I wound up here! Me an’ my buds got scooped up and landed here! They’re all dead now, but I became this!”

     He spread his arms and wings out to present himself, then held himself like that, as if waiting for something.

“Uh, very...cool?”

“You’re damn right very cool! Waitwait, so, you been to an ant world then?”

“Same as you, actually. I’m a human, from a human world. I got ‘scooped up’ and thrown down here. Would’ve died too if my friend hadn’t made this suit for me.”

“Oooooh, a human! Not a big fan, honestly, you guys suck. But I mean hey! We’ve got something in common, buddy! Also, that explains why you smell like four demons. Was about to kill you haha!”

“Are you...sure about that? I’ve got a lord in here?”

“Pfft, yeah, so? I’m an ant, baby! I don’t care if you’re a human or a bear or an elephant, I’ll bite and sting anyone who messes with me!”

     I couldn’t help but chuckle. That was true, some ants didn’t care who or what threatened them and attacked all the same. Thinking about that, compared to my fear of the Demon Gods, I almost felt ridiculous. I held out my hand to him, “I’m James, it’s nice to meet you.”

“Oh, yeah, one of those name things? I’m um. Uhhhhhhhhh, Andre! Just call me that!”

“Is that your name or…?”

“Dunno! Just something I heard humans say! Kinda like the way it sounds, so that’s my name!”

“Right. Andre. So you’re also stuck down here.”

“Right, right, yeah. First I was up top, then I got changed and escaped. Then I kinda just wandered around for awhile. Then some demons were curious about me and said they had food if I followed them, so of course I did! They brought me down here to some place, kinda looked like a human city, but less bright. I was there, but turns out the food they had was just trash! I think they thought I was a moth or something, but I couldn’t eat any of that wool crap! So I’ve been flying out and hunting my own demons to eat. That’s when I came across this big fella, put up more of a fight than I was expecting, wings got wet, I was just waiting for them to dry off when you showed up with all the lightning and stuff!”

“I...see. Then, do you remember how to get back? To that city?”

“Nope!”

“Shit.”

“Buuuuut I left scent trail! I’ll be able to follow that back, so you just gotta follow me! Er, when my wings dry.”

“We don’t need to wait, just stand at the front of the boat and tell me where to steer.”

“Oh! So I’ll be like one of those human uhhhhh boat...queen guys. Cup tain?”

“Captain.”

“Yeah, a captain! Right! Follow my lead, buddy, and we’ll make it back to dry land!”

     With that, Andre moved to the front of the boat, setting his foot upon the edge and wiggled his antennae around. Once he’d found the scent trace, he put three of his hands on his hips and used the last one to point, “That-a way!”

     So, controlling the propeller again, I directed our boat on the path he lead which seemed to be imprecise. We ended up veering off course, going in a few circles, even finding out way back to the corpse again. It seems his fight took him all over the place and the resulting scent trail was equally chaotic.

     Still, after some time, we found something undeniably glowing in the distance. A monolithic dark-gray tower adorned with glowing deep-blue ridges traveling down along its surface came into view. Then, smaller buildings of similar design emerged around the base of the tower. Andre looked back toward me, puffing his chest out and boasted,

“See! I told you I’d get us there! Welcome to...uh...I forgot what they called this place. Shitty lack-of-food city!”