As the first drop-ships descended quietly through the clouds, signals were not being received. In the last months, initial scouting forces had been sent to various locations across the planet, setting up tech and paving the way for the overall invasion fleet to arrive.
The ground installations had stopped sending signals some few days earlier, and despite the highly vocal concerns of the fleets military Elders, Home-World had seen no reason for the invasion to not commence...
In the Fields, millions of soldiers were now fully restored and were readying themselves for battle.
The vast fungal network that comprised this Forest-Mind was breaking down. Hard wired genetic locks and programming were forcing the dense fibres, trunks and tendrils to initiate cellular suicide. It was a triggered apoptosis, where the Forest-Mind was induced to kill itself; disassembling itself at the cellular level.
Deep in the seemingly endless and murky darkness of the forest an old soldier was untangling his long skinny limbs from the cloying mat of fungi and organic detritus holding him in a tight embrace, deep within the vegetal womb. He had managed to force a hand free. It pushed up into nothingness and a sharp light suddenly poured into the tiny cavity he was in. With a hiss he pulled back reflexively. His eyes had seen nothing at all, not even darkness, for over forty years. And his eyes, only freshly reconstituted, were reacting savagely to any new sensation. Now, long dormant neurons were crackling sharply, jolting his brain slowly up to the surface of dirty consciousness.
His one free hand clutched at nothing as its owner began to heave and struggle weakly against the mesh now slowly breaking away from his body.
It was like this for an interminable time that the old grunt rested, his lungs filling with damp cloying air. It was the first air he'd breathed in forty years. He began remembering (forgetting?) things. Odd flashes of sound and light were jolting through his brain.
There was a pressure around his free hand, and the old soldier was tugged slowly and painfully from his little nook in the fungal miasma. He groaned weakly as he was pulled out and laid down on the forest floor.
He tried to lift his head. All four of his eyes were seeing mostly darkness but something bright was approaching him with an almost silent hum.
