LOCKED DOCUMENT REQUESTED OVERRIDE SUCCESSFUL

LOCKED DOCUMENT REQUESTED OVERRIDE SUCCESSFUL WARNING: Significant cognito-hazard detected! Biological entities should proceed with extreme caution. ACCESSING...

"We heard them before we saw them. Felt them before we heard them. The children were the first to notice, running home with tales of earth moving under their toes. A thump thump thump, thundering deep below the sand." "I doubted - we all did. Until the day of the great storm. As the first heavy raindrops hit the dust, the rumbling deepened. Everyone heard it. Something huge was shifting beneath the surface of the planet."

"See?" cried our children in brief triumph, before hiding fearful faces. We were all afraid. But when the first worm breached the surface, we couldn't look away. It was breathtaking." "So colossal was the beast that it cast our whole settlement into darkness, splitting the sky like black lightning as it leapt overhead." "Worm by worm, they rose from the desert. A few at first, then dozens, bursting from the ground and diving back below. Migrating." ...

"The ingestion cycle has been tradition for as long as anyone can remember." "There are no requirements to become a sacrifice: no restrictions of status or age. We are all equal under the great worms. Anyone may enter the maw." "Every storm season, we each hope to be chosen. We arrange ourselves in lines across the desert, arms lifted to the sky."