Gluttony

He saw many other residents of this place rise and hurry in the direction of the noise. Even the frail or elderly ones who lay in place, hardly moving, roused themselves to hobble and crawl in the wake of the others. More than fifty residents in total followed the sound. The ones which had received their food brought their platters with, careful not to spill any of their precious rations. The handful which waited in line for food and the ones which controlled the cookpots were the only ones of this community that did not investigate. Neither did the young woman's companions, nor the ones wearing red mantles that watched over the eating area.

Other red-mantled guards did investigate. Among them was the leader of the strangers in red. The young woman went, as well. He also followed.

One of the smaller residents had broken away a portion of the outer wall. Chips and chunks of stone lay in piles before a gaping hole. The small resident, and others of similar size, clustered around the hole. They gibbered in excitement, reaching towards the floor to snatch something up from a dark, undulating tide which surged and flowed from the hole. They raised their hands to their mouths after, then repeated the motion. The larger citizens did as well, when they reached a place where they could interact with the strange tide.

He saw the tide was made of countless scurrying beetles, fat and bloated scarabs so large that three or four of them would fill one's palm. Their carapaces were dark and shimmered slightly in the weak greenish light cast by the luminescent paste which filled the clear jars and clung to the ends of metal rods. The residents scooped them up. The beetles kicked their spiny legs uselessly, until the residents pulled them off, one by one. After, some of them chose to twist off the scarabs' blunt heads. Others shoveled the twitching insects into their mouths whole. Regardless, teeth crunched through the beetles' exoskeletons to get at the pulpy flesh which lay inside.

The strangers in red tried to stop them at first. They shouted. They used the shafts of their weapons as bludgeons on a few of the residents. But the strangers in red were too few to stop all of them, and they gave up trying to stop the feast as a whole. Some residents, the ones that had been around the cookpot, or those which had the luck or foresight to bring rusted containers along, began scooping some of the writhing mass into the objects they carried, and the red-mantled ones focused their attention on those individuals. They exchanged words and brandished their weapons, and those citizens capitulated to the demands of the strangers in red. They surrendered their full or half-full containers, some more reluctantly than others, then proceeded to gorge themselves as the others did. Scarabs skittered beneath the piles of rubble, desperate for sanctuary, but the piles were cleared aside by the residents.

Then a few of the red-mantled ones were dispatched to the center of the large room by their leader. They returned a short while later with more empty containers, and these were disseminated to the gathered crowd. Those citizens surrendered these containers once they were filled, and a chain of labor was quickly implemented to maximize the efficiency of collecting the scurrying beetle horde. Some of the citizens were also sent back to the center of the cavernous room, escorted by the strangers in red.

The young woman was caught up in this chaos, and though she was not a resident of this place, this fact was ignored or overlooked by the strangers in red. They gave her a container and commanded her to go to work filling it. He watched her try to argue, but her words went unheeded. She collected beetles as well, yanking off legs and heads before dropping the plump remainder into her container. Chitin clacked against metal and more chitin as the contained filled.

The swarm of beetles, though it seemed endless, lessened eventually. Fewer of the insects crawled from the hole. The containers filled more slowly. The smaller citizens tried to wriggle inside the gap in the wall. They stretched with their arms and managed to extract a few dozen more, but the bulk of the insects had already been harvested. The small ones stepped back and informed the others that there were no more scarabs to be found here. This prompted the strangers in red to command all the residents back to the center of the room.

He saw the young woman slink along the wall, away from the gathered crowd and towards the piles of rubble that had been cleared away earlier. The red-mantled ones were focused on the residents of this place, of making sure they were all accounted. She carried her container of beetles with her. He watched her hide it among the relocated piles of rock.