The nanobot Swarm raced down Mal's urethra, headed for his testicles. Not that they knew the name of the Hive, i.e., their bonded male host, but that's who they were in. The Swarm's instructions were clear — eliminate DuoHalo, repair and restore any damaged lung function, repair and improve reproductive function — in this host, primarily sperm production, as there was no urethral damage observed by the nanobots during transit. The Swarm had not received the signal that would trigger a regeneration, so general repairs to the host's body were still locked away.
As they reached the testes, the Swarm came to a halt — a scene of devastation lay before them — sperm, many heavily damaged or mutated, were strewn around like protein litter, clumped and tangled together.
"What the fu-" some of the cluster started to transmit before they were cut off.
"Alright, 'ites, here's what we're gonna do. Half of us are gonna hop into that blood vessel over there — no not that one, the one headed for the heart. Of that lot, twenty percent of you guys are gonna head to the lungs and get started on Directive 2. The rest of you will spread out through the bloodstream and be alert for DuoHalo. If that sneaky, nasty virus sends one virion particle into our host-"
"Contain, neutralize, eliminate!" came the response from the assembled swarm.
One nanobot expressed an interrogative, "Hold on a second? Who put you in charge?"
"We're not in charge, 'ite, We thought you were?" the nanobot it had directed the question to responded.
"Nope, we-"
"You lot settle down. None of you are in charge, this is the collective giving direction. It's easier for the readers to have one voice doing exposition, and you're all featureless, interchangeable nanobots, with no personalities.
"The remaining half of the Swarm cluster, we've got work to do. We want to see every sperm cleaned up! If you can verify the head contains an undamaged half-DNA strand, excellent, otherwise scrap it for components."
"This is gonna take forever. We should just scrap all of it for components." One 'ite groused.
The collective responded, "NO! Remember-"
"Every sperm is sacred," came the mass intoned response.
"Exactly. At least, as long as it's inside the balls-walls. Once it's launched out the artillery, we don't care. Now, we've got a lot of work here — we want to see heads nicely prolate, no lumpy business, and tails unkinked and free to move. And 'ites, remember, ONE head and ONE DNA-half strand per sperm! None of that duploid or triploid shit."
The Swarm spread out to get to work.
"Oh, my, my, my, 'ite, what have we here?" One nanobot had come across a tangled and twisted lump of sperm. "Eight, nine, ten. Oh, and it looks like their tails are all tied together, the poor things." The clumpy mass wriggled toward the nanobot.
"Back away, 'ite!" The collective boomed. "That's a Sperm King! We don't repair those, we scrap them for parts. Multiple nanobots rushed in and quickly dismantled the tangle, the individual heads, tails, and scraps of DNA momentarily floating before being absorbed by the balls-walls.
"A'ight, show's over, 'ites, back to work!" The collective said. In a quieter voice it muttered, "Sure hope we get some reinforcements soon. We need some help with this mess."
*****
The nanobot clusters that had followed the collective's instructions to travel to the heart were making good time — despite the host's truly fucked up reproductive cells, his heart certainly seemed to be in good condition, and the clusters had hopped into the right gonadal vein, which connected directly to the inferior vena cava, and then to the right atrium of the heart. In less than a second, the clusters separated to follow their directions, one fifth heading to the lungs, and the remaining eighty percent deploying to travel the host's circulatory system, remaining on high alert for DuoHalo.
The clusters reached the lungs, slogging their way through some collections of gooey mucus they'd unwittingly blundered into in their haste to reach their destination.
"Okay, 'ites, what the fuck is this? The host has screwed up balls AND screwed up lungs? Are those alveoli hardened? And those ones are totally blocked with this mucus crap! FRAN's code, how is this human operational?"
"Clusters! Scout and report on lung condition and function!" came the command from the collective.
The nanobot clusters scattered, inspecting and assessing the lungs, testing the elasticity of the tiny air sacs that enabled oxygen perfusion into the bloodstream. One small group, inspecting a particular alveoli, was cut off, as a clump of mucus slowly oozed over the entrance to the sac. The stranded nanobots transmitted their distress to the collective, and immediately received instruction to attempt to break through the gooey plug. Halfway through, one nanobot collided with a particularly hardened wad of crud. "'ites! We're stuck! We don't think we can make it! Go on, recover us later when we clear this crap out! We'll see if we can't reverse and work on rehabbing that sac until the cluster reaches this part of the lung."
The stranded nanobot started to reverse course, but it was quite stuck in the hardened mucus. "Well, fuck," the 'ite muttered. "Maybe we'll just start cleaning up right here." It began agitating the mucus surrounding it until it had a less sticky, more fluid consistency. The fluid mucus softened the surface of the hardened clump, allowing the nanobot to pull free and return to the air sac.
"We're back in the sac, collective. We'll begin restoring elasticity and permeability to the sac walls, unless we're directed otherwise."
The collective responded, "Acceptable, 'ite, carry on. Lung clusters report that the host has approximately 58.008% of nominal lung function, due to a combination of excessive mucus secretions and stiffened alveoli. Restoring full lung function will require a three-pronged approach, but eliminating the mucus will require additional time — rapid corrective action could result in excessive host discomfort.
"Half of us in the lungs will work on rehabilitating damaged alveoli. Limber up the sac walls, massage them to restore their permeability, and make them able to properly transfer O2 to the blood again. We want the Hive's lungs to be as strong and flexible as Gumbercules! A quarter of us will work on reducing the secretions. Turn off those damn taps, so we're not adding to this swamp while we're trying to drain it!"
The collective paused, while the designated percentages split off to go to work as instructed. The remaining quarter of the lung-assigned clusters held their position, awaiting collective instruction.
"A'ight, us lot. We've got a frustrating task. We've gotta work slow and careful-like. We can't just turn all this mucus into froth — the host will feel like he's drowning. We need to break off manageable chunks, and get them positioned and ready to be expelled when he coughs. We may need to detail some 'ites to trigger coughs if the host doesn't cooperate. We know, we all want to be as quick and efficient as possible, but this task is important and quick is not what we need right now. 'Careful and Considerate' is our task motto! Understand, 'ites!?"
"Yes, collective! Careful and Considerate! Chunk that mucus! Tickle that throat! Make the host hack it oat!"
"You lot can't rhyme for shit."
*****
Meanwhile, far from the lungs, smaller clusters of nanobots were cruising along through the host's circulatory system. "Woohoo, ride'em, cow'ite!" one nanobot whooped, as it clung to a red blood cell as it whooshed along the lateral sacral artery.
"What are we doing, 'ite?!" the collective boomed. "We don't play around — are you developing a personality? You're directed to report back to the ball-gazines, for evaluation and possible early return to a female host for reprocessing!"
"Yes, collective," the 'ite responded. Spotting something unusual, the nanobot released its grip on the red blood cell and floated down an adjacent branch.
"Hey, collective? We've found something here — we think it might be why the sperm-production facility is fucked up. Looks like there's a blockage — no, wait, this isn't a blockage, this looks like it might be trauma-related. Collective, do we know if the host was ever kicked in the nuts?"
"And just how would we know that, 'ite? Do we look like we have access to the host's memories? That function isn't unlocked until a status condition of over 8000 is achieved!" The collective sounded annoyed, but that was probably just because half of it was dealing with heavily mutated sperm, ten percent of it was dealing with obstructed lungs, and over a third of it was zipping around the host's circulatory system at three feet per second — back to the heart every three minutes.
"Oh, right. Sorry, collective. Anyway, it looks like one of the smaller arteries feeding the right gonad is mostly crushed — the passage is so narrow, blood cells are having difficulty getting through — fortunately, they're not slowed enough to clump, but we think there's enough restriction to affect the production equipment."
The collective seethed. "Well, fuck. That'd do it. Okay, 'ite. We're routing additional nanobots to that location to assist in repairing the damage and restoring proper supply. Maybe then we can FINALLY stop having to deal with these blasted Sperm Kings. Swear to FRAN, it's like we dispatch one into the balls-walls, and another fuses together a half-second later! We've had point-oh-five percent of 'ites knocked out of commission already!
"We had one fuse on TOP of an 'ite. Poor bugger never knew what hit us. Drained of energy in an instant. We'll send all of the drained 'ites back to a female host on the next fuck. But we gotta figure out how to stop those damn things from spawning."
*****
"Collective?" One nanobot transmitted a request for additional process-attention cycles. "We've been evaluating the host's health status, and it seems that the Hive doesn't sleep that well. We see some indicators of snoring — elevated blood pressure and some markers of minor hypoxia during rest cycles." The 'ite absently rotated in place as it reported its findings to the collective.
"But there's also a really weird biochemical temporal marker. It looks like he wakes up every morning about 4 am local time, but for 96.75% of the last 123 days, the host was only conscious for a couple of minutes before he returned to sleep for anywhere from another 60 to 90 minutes. This is causing an undesirable interru-"
!SCHL-ZAP!
"'Ite? Come again, 'ite, transmission was interrupted. 'Ite? 'Ite? Have any of us got sensors on that nanobot?"
"It was a Sperm King, collective! Another one fused right on top of that 'ite! We dispatched it, but they keep forming! We're down another oh-point-six-four percent of 'ites! When are we getting reinforcements, collective? I don't know how long we can hold out! Oh, shit! I said I! I'll report for reprocessing, collect-"
!SCHL-ZAP!
"FRAN-damnit! What's going on with that blood vessel repair? We need to get this situation under control! 'Ites! Get that Sperm King there! Look out, another one is forming!"
