He no longer crawled, or whined. He strode now, and commanded, though as yet there was little to command. And the depths where he walked beneath the earth were no longer dark or silent. The maze of corridors and rooms had gradually come alive, and he stood now in a central room that was lit brilliantly to his sensitive eyes, and that hummed with power.

Power. He savored it. He had been beneath the earth for months now, emerging only when hunger drove him. He had learned much, but better than the knowledge was the power that had come with it, the power that had woken beneath his hands. "I am no longer the weakest," he said to himself, and his lips parted in a sharp-toothed grin. "No, no longer the weakest at all. And soon... very soon..."

He caressed the cold device that he held in his lap as he sat at the center of the room, with a touch like a lover's, and dreamed of the glory to come. "Soon..."