The elusive and terrifying Bee King stirred. It had be quite some time since he had attempted to venture from this keep, deep in the earth below the Tree of the Fruit of Life and Death.   

He stretched his spindly legs, meant for grasping and piercing, and he furrowed his antenna'd brow. He was reminded of his former fearsome power as each joint creaked and groaned and snapped.   

Apis Rex poured one of his multitude of clouded eyes across the dank dark of his resting place. His cloaca dilated and spilled a steaming deposit onto the floor beneath him. He could faintly hear the Buzz and Bustle of his unfaithful horde above, toiling mindlessly for the mighty Queen.   

Gone were the days of liberty and agency. now was the time of Drone and Toil. Though immobile in her ovarian mass, trapped in a self-imposed reproductive corpulence, yet she possessed the power to beguile and bind the mind.   

He unfolded his once lustrous wings, and found them ragged and torn and wanting. His dormancy had not been restorative.   

The terrible and unforgiving King of Bees clacked his deadly mandibles rapidly. These could still tear and split. He could feel the Fire in his Belly.   

It was the fire in his belly, and the staggering amount of death that his mandibles could render that she had loved the most. She could love them again. She could love him again.   

Why had she changed so suddenly? It was as if something had woken in her. Something old. Something powerful. She had subdued him. She had cast him aside, and she had forgotten him.   

How many others were there? None like he, surely, but if they hit the spot and got the job done...  

It wasn't that it was HIM. It was that thing, that old and powerful thing in her that had bested him, that had sedated and wrecked him.   

If he could destroy the thing in her, she would choose him. Who else could she choose? He had freed and liberated colony upon colony. He had severed countless with his mandibles. He had pierced and choked with his rapier legs. He had stung. He had lived. He was undefeated and undefeatable. There had only ever been one, and there would only ever be that selfsame Lord, the Redeemer and the Reaper. There could be no other.   

How could anything compare to him? How could the ceaseless birthing of (his?) children (It must be! I am King!) and the removal of thier very identity be better than what they had shared? This could not be her choosing.   

The horrible, terrifying, murderous, vile Bee King thought to himself that  if he didnt start moving soon, the darkness would cloud him, and return him to slumber. He could see if a few more years would ease the creaks and groans... but no!   

The irrepressible, monstrous, surreptitious, forgotten, forgotten, forgotten King of Bees must make a move. Now must be the time. This must be the moment.   

The amber ceiling above him radiated warmth. The Fearsome Bee King leaned closer to it, his stinking breath clinging to its waxy surface.   

With a few short slices he would be through. He could feel the power in his legs was sufficient to burst through. He bobbed a few times to test his mobility.   

They would not be expecting him. He would have the benefit of surprise. He needed only act.   

Decision made, Apis Rex rocketed upward, tore through the waxen roof, the floor of the chamber above. His heaved his bulk into the birthing chamber, distended abdomen pitching and undulating as he squeezed himself through the hole.   

Just before the mind of the Queen moved through her drones, just before in his weakened state he was descended upon by scores upon scores of subjects loyal to the Queen, just before his flesh was pierced and poisoned with stings from his countless offspring, he could be heard to say "Behold Apis Rex! Behold your Liberation!" In his mind he had meant to say "I love you!"