The Ant and the Grasshopper and World Domination
And all while, the little ant prepared and worked and stored food for the upcoming winter, and the silly grasshopper played and relaxed and smoked weed.
Then, the winter months were upon the bugs. The ant was warm and well-fed, taking shelter in the home he had prepared all summer with his kin. And outside, there was the grasshopper, shivering and starving, on the brink.
The ant had every reason to turn its thorax on the suffering hopper, after its merciless teasing of the poor ant’s thorough work habits. Every reason to say “I told you so!”
But the ant was bigger than that, despite being literally very, very small.
“Come stay with me grasshopper,” the ant said.
“Really, Mr. Ant? After I was such a fool?”
“Think nothing of it old friend. What’s past is past.”
And the grasshopper came in and got warm in the ant’s home.
“I guess you showed me.”
“The moral of the story is to always be prepared,” the ant man-splained, cause it was a man, “that’s why many ants are still working, even now.”
“What about that guy?”
The grasshopper pointed to a particularly war-scarred ant with giant mandibles for ripping flesh from bone.
“That ant is an army ant, and its mandibles are too glorious for menial labor,” the ant explained, “but that fella did his part in preparing too, by stealing the young from a neighboring nest. Now, the stolen youngling works for us and feeds the strong army ant.”
“Like a slave?”
“Like a slave,” the ant confirmed.
“The moral of the story is always be prepared, and the weak will serve the strong.”
“Oh sweet grasshopper Jesus!”
The silly grasshopper pointed in terror at a parade of ants carrying their dying and dead.
“Oh yes, those dead ants were old and weak. So, they are being carried to the garbage where all useless things go,” the ant giggled. “The moral of the story is always be prepared, the weak will serve the strong, and the elderly are useless garbage.”
“Man, I just remembered I got work early tomorrow.”
“And so, the preparation continues.”
“But it’s winter already! What are you preparing for, my dear friend ant?”
“For the genocide, of course,” the ant said like it wasn’t a big thing, “in the spring we will burst forth from our nest, the army enraged, and we will destroy every living thing in our path. When will consume the flesh of the weak we will all be stronger, and the truth of our sacred queen will reach far and wide.”
“Do I just leave the same way I came in, it’s dark in here.”
“Yes, our sacred queen. The true queen of the true race of ants. All will fall to us in our great consuming. The moral of the story is always be prepared, the weak will serve the strong, the elderly are useless garbage, and the one true Queen will reign over all for one thousand years.”
“Why is this door locked? I don’t remember the door being locked.”
“Why would you go out there, friend grasshopper?” the ant asked, “you didn’t prepare, so you belong down here with us.”
The ant’s army of death approached the grasshopper.
“Dude, I just didn’t have my shit together this summer all right, I was busy finding myself.”
And the silly grasshopper was torn to pieces to feed the Queen’s ravenous army.
The moral of the story is never trust people who seem to have their lives perfectly put together, it’s all right to be a little lost now and again, and always be prepared.
