Below the breeze, balancing atop a broad broken branch of a once braided bridge, a particular pigeon picked a place to perch.

Along the airstreams, my splintered swarm of probes gather information from every plane, vein, forest, cloud, fog, miasma, storm, and river, on every level of depth this planet has.

The gas giant not two steps from the humans is incredibly vivid in specta they cannot see.

From the brightest, sunniest and starriest layers of the atmosphere, to the murkiest, foggiest, most turbulent clusters of crooked canopies.

A drizzle over my drone-swarm turned to downfall, and dropped a dozen drones of mine into deeper, drifting air streams.

I let them wander, despite knowing smaller swarms fare far worse against the weather, the wind, and the wild. I was confident, though. My swarm is ubiqitous, The chances are they would find another swarm eventually. A single probe passed some smaller tangled ferns until the cleaner, clearer aura framing the fringes of a forest pulled it in.

I did not see the pigeon at first. They sat still, but I heard a hum and turned to it. I saw a beacon of light, a different frequency than the sun or any bioluminsecent flora. We flew closer to investigate.

I knew at this point that there are creatures that sing in ceremonies. But only in groups. I had guessed this one was practicing. Though with the solidity, the steadiness of the tone being emitted from this bird, I would assume they did not need to practice. Maybe this was a gamble, that they may have more lenient expectations of the Dren they would catch.

So I approached. The tone paused when my presence piqued the pigeons senses, then resumed louder.

I stuck one of my probes out and flew toward the light. Upon landing, myriads of new subroutines in the probes took over, and the drone took on a different kind of processing and communicating.

I was not talking, merely flowing sounds as i found the focus to form words. And before I could buzz any kind of coherency that Drek are used to, I felt some vibrations in return.

Now, the "Dren" language is a rather static, instinct-derived language, but this does not mean it is simple.

Our wings vibrate to produce different tones at a wide range of frequencies.

The angle of these vibrations will vary tonal quality, and the speed of these vibrations vary pitch. Some tones can be entered with up or downward inflections. These buzzing tones grow in intensity, stacking in both directions of the harmonic 3-series, or 5-series.

Using wings, legs, mouths, and other various clacking parts of bug anatomy to click are recognized like consonants.

Their syntax and organization is more cyclical and recursive than any Earthen language.

I picked up their trills and coos, attempting to process their linguistic symbols. Noise. I needed work, but this is the opportunity to put that work in. The rest of my probes in the wider atmosphere were set to do whatever they would, and I stuck with the Drek for some time, providing imperative information about their surroundings that they couldn't see, in the same way I would communicate to other swarms. I did not fully understand this larger creature, but I understood the symbiosis of Drek and Dren, just from learning how to be a Dren.

I stuck with this Drek for days. I let the rest of my swarmlet progress, and guided my host upstream to follow, hopping through wind veins and across forests. I found myself more and more lost, unsure how to coordinate myself relevant to other swarms.

A certain kind of miasma that passed on a layer over us had weakened my view of the stars. My options seemed less and less viable, and the power sources of the drones don't recharge enough on the static of the wind.

I had to get higher up in the atmosphere, and the veins have slipped me lower. I could feel, directly above me, the presence of a remnant of my swarm. I felt the shade shift as if a cloud stream carrying an island was moving over us. The forest was bright, and so I sent a beacon from my upper swarm, and received it down where I was. So, I pulled the bird that direction. But we did not fly. I pulled again. This bird seemed stubborn, taking off but not going the direction I wanted it. Maybe this distance was too great for them to safely cross?

But they climbed. I felt a commotion of surroundings as I felt our elevation raise. I tossed about and attempted to make sense of what I was picking up until eventually I felt a burst of sunlight. The bird had climbed to the highest point in the forest. They hummed. I pulled again. They took flight, flapping upward, gliding down, flapping harder, breaking the usual patterns of flap and glide that Drek take. I was pushing this bird's physicality. I was tiring it. We gained just enough height to be above the surface of the forest floor, but were far enough away that gliding would put us too low. The bird vocalizes in panicked bursts. I run some calculations and respond.

[ smhie ]

Left. Left. Go left. The bird hesitates. Left, I signal.

[ smhie:smhie:smhie:smhie ]

Behind the island, a hurricane spins, curving the vein the island travels through. Without much hesitation, the bird dives.

As we approach the storm, I say to turn up. The bird does, just in time to change the angle of their momentum. The storm whips the air underneath us, flinging us around then letting us loose, barreling straight toward the underside of the forest, and getting tangled in the webby dangling roots beneath its lowest branches.

The bird climbs up out of the ground and grumbles, wretches, spits, and removes me to wipe dirt and roots from their feathers. I take the time to retune with my nearby swarms. They are certainly still here. The shifting light through the leaves hits me and warms my energy stores enough to let me call a few other bugs over. I am not in a rush, and concluded it would be beneficial to me to keep this companion, and acknowledge the trouble I put them through by apologizing. I know how to acknowledge one has bumped into another bug, but do not know the words for carrying a dren into a crash. I click a few times to attempt.

[ au;pA. ]

I heard the bird repeat my sounds, followed by more of their own.

[—: au;pA? ueuqes tu au;pA? ]

This was a coherent response. This bird had intelligence. I repeated my apology. I heard more vocalizations. Higher, clickier, buzzier.

[ —:tuAtAtA;kiekAte;hiese;hiete;InIn;aupA;kiekAtO. ]

This was a cluster of Dren code. This bird was telling me not to apologize, because I saved their life.

[ —: st:sOtO;hue:tO;tuAtAtA;kiekAtO: tepehe;pAtA:pAtO;qAitA:pAitA:pncn:nepe;reketA? ]

This was challenging for the bird, and they were confused as to why i made them make that leap. I told the bird I must return to my swarm, and that's where they were nearest.

[—: tuAtAtA;qAitA;tete;hAitA;kehe;prhe;qAiaA;tepehe: ]

The bird told me gold beetles have always been said to be demanding. I simplified the concept of solar power and told them we all need the sun's warmth to be healthy.

[—:kiekAtA;tntn;anan;IrheIrhe;tntn:kehe;prhe;sesn]

Conveniently, the rest of my swarm appeared, and I buzzed them into a ring around the bird for a moment before backing them away. I added that I also needed to be closer to my swarm, and detached myself to dance with them. I plucked another probe out of the storm and landed on the bird's head once again. I spun the swarm around them and buzzed them off to back where they came.

The bird stood with their mouth agape for a moment, but nodded and left the brush, wandering into the more open-caged and gridded city further into the forest.

Sure enough, we heard buzzing from a nearby temple. I signaled to my bird host that we were ok for the time being. The bird hummed but didn't click like before. Maybe it was uncouth to talk to your bug around other birds. We stayed on that island for a few days passage. I let this bird wander and talk to other birds. I left them to their own devices and went back to a more de-personalized form of observing.

With the pigeon as an anchor for my probes to coordinate around, I listened to the island as the entire system it was. From the flora's hazy vibrations through themselves and into the air, to the organic beetles and other bugs and other fascinating, fickle fauna that frequented the fruit and flowers in a much familiar way. The signals I kept most attuned to, however, were the drek's linguistic patterns. The quickest things to pick up were the greetings and introductions, which are frequent enough to easily decipher.

aaAlA for "hello", qos tu anOmnin zeuhmOs? to ask someone's name.

Just as often, I heard my host's name.

usakAsA anAnkhe

Vas'akasha 'An'ankhe.

Which they shorten to Vas'An, or Vasan.

My previous directives and programming were measurements, by humans with no knowledge of or interest in these bird creatures. In all of my many tangential experiences with them, never did I grasp the depth of their sophistication. It occurs to me that Vasan is exploring a social center, having nuanced conversations, wandering interiors. This is a city. The places the bugs gather are temples for the Drek to congregate ritually. There is a community, structure, a society within these flying forests. This is a civilization.

So. I had a spearhead of information, a sharpened edge to penetrate the deeper complexity of this planet. I had found contact with an intellectual race of bird-like, people-like dragons within the humans' solar system. All of this information was being relayed within a smaller swarm on this lower plane, and knowing each probes limited memory, I knew I needed to get these signals all the way to the moonbase to consolidate them.

But for now, I have safety and support. As the voices from around us fade, Vasan plucks me off.

“tu uesti uearos?“ They ask.

I grasp a few of these patterns, but still clumsily arrange my clicks. uAt;teu;ieu:mei;nn?

The bird compares, “You think like a Drek but talk like a Dren.”

I tell the bird I cannot speak like anything else but what my probes allow..

“There's something more to you.” They coo through the air, “You know more words than bugs do, you learn.”

I click in affirmative.

“What are you?”

I arranged my sounds to be closer to theirs and chittered out, ”ai;am;th;mAi;nt;a;th;suArm;uAsAn“

“What? Mind of the swarm?” The bird is perplexed. “Is that what you said?”

I affirm.

“How does that work, you think for all beetles?”

The bird paces around the space, bumping into some vines that recoil and flinch.

I tell them all dren think, that this one is designated to speak what they think.

“Ok. Why are you talking to me? Out of any other Drek?”

I tell them no reason in particular. Pure chance.

The bird takes a pause. “I'm just lucky.”

I click to confirm, they are.

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