I took a deep breath.
"We will definitely win at life, my girls. And then, everybody will live happily ever after, and not even just for a few months, or years... There will be decades of good life!"
After this, I gesture Foehamr to turn the transmission off. For a mont, the silence lingered...
Then I heard a sob.
My head spun toward the sound, and I saw Worriesgone tearing up.
"This was so touching, F-father, Mother," she said, rubbing her eyes. "You s-said such, such n-nice things! I n-never tho-thought..."
Echoing her, other Artists bees in the room were tearing up, too. The Researcher looked away and was suspiciously rubbing her face, and only Foehamr was acting calm, although her expression was also full of unnad emotions.
"Hey, hey, hey! Don’t—!" I tried to get up, but Amby kept tightly in her lap.
"They will calm down on their own, Necty. Right now, there are way more bees that we have infected with these feelings—you can’t help them all."
Damn, she was right! If the bees who were already closest to —especially Worriesgone—got too touched, the other girls, ones that never saw in person but still treated like an idol, would be even more emotional...
I let out a breath and tried to relax, only to look at Amby suspiciously the next mont.
"You sound very proud of this, Amby. I an—I’m glad that you said sothing so emotionally open in public. For you, it must’ve been no small feat, but—"
But was she just doing this to emotionally manipulate our children? I didn’t doubt that Amby loved our girls, but she was always much more pragmatic than I was. And she also taught our daughter-Queens how to rule efficiently, which also ant so... let’s just say, practical psychology.
I didn’t want to say this aloud near our girls, though. Of course, they could still read my mind, but they were clearly not in the state to do so.
Amby, however, caught my thought anyway. Probably even without mind reading.
"It’d be unfitting for an Empress to be unable to do sothing so small when you can do it easily," she replied, smiling at . "And I, too, want them to feel valued."
I smiled, too.
By then, the other bees in the radio room pulled themselves together. Foehamr cleared her throat and I turned to her.
"Father, Mother, I got reports from the bees monitoring several sub-hives for the reaction to this radio transmission. It was a massive success! Everybody who heard your words was overco by emotion. They will carry the mory of these minutes for months and years to co."
"So until next month it is," I said, nodding to myself. "Perhaps I should read sothing calr next ti–like a newsletter. Don’t you agree?"
***
The notable events of today didn’t end with radio transmissions. Soon after I and Amby returned to Hive Supremo and I returned to my delayed paperwork, Attendant Helping-Hands entered my office.
"Father, Oracle Undecided wanted to speak with you. She said that she had discovered sothing about the location of the hornet forces."
"Really? Then tell her to co here as soon as possible!" I pushed a stack of paper away, eager to take a break from reading them. "Let’s hope it’s sothing good. Oh, and bring a calming tea for her beforehand. Just in case..."
When Undecided ca to my office, I knew imdiately that I had guessed right with the tea. Even after she took a gulp from the cup given to her by Helping-Hands, Undecided was still almost shaking.
Twitching like this was pretty normal for her, so I didn’t feel imdiately alard.
"Father, I saw good things in my dreams and bad things," she said, sitting on the offered chair. "The good things were just what you wanted to happen, and the bad things were awful."
Before I could ask for more details, Undecided blushed and looked into her cup.
"I’m sorry, Father, I can’t give you a proper report again, right? And I’m the Chief Oracle..."
I let out a breath and patted her shoulder.
"You can do it. Just relax, my dear."
She blushed harder, then straightened.
"I saw a dream where Malevolence’s forces found a place where the murder hornets hid their hives. Malevolence’s army is close to it, so she can find it by the end of the week even without any hints... But after this, she could do nothing about it!"
"Huh? Why?"
Undecided explained, and the more she talked, the more I frowned. When she finished her report, I still had nothing to say, and for a while, there was silence.
"Thank you for bringing this. As for what to do with this information... Well, I will think about it. Please keep watching over Malevolence’s future."
"I will, Father!" Undecided nodded resolutely and tried to rise, leaving behind the half-full teacup.
"And you can sit here while you finish your tea. If you want to."
She bit her lip and blushed a little again.
"Oh. Thank you, Father! It’s... Thank you. I won’t interrupt you?"
I smiled at her and reached out to pat her hair.
It was a pity that there were only so many hours in a day and I couldn’t spend an equal amount of ti with all my daughters, so it was good to do it at least occasionally, at least like this.
"Not at all, Undecided."
So she watched from the sidelines, and I twirled a pencil in my head and thought about how to help Malevolence.
Because I knew for sure even without Undecided’s predictions—if she went in directly, maybe things wouldn’t go terribly imdiately, but within another week or two... or perhaps even less... sothing would surely explode at us.
Well, not "sothing", soone—hornets.
"Oh, I know!" I exclaid, sitting up. "Forget everything else—this ti I *must* send my astral projection there, even if ans traveling on a dragon so my telepathy could reach this far!"
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