Whilst we were rebuilding the hives with our new material and deciding upon how to react to the beetle incursion, the beetles began to grow bolder. A series of skirmishes broke out, with each starting when large groups of the beetles would suddenly emerge from behind their lines and charge to the berry bushes. There they would quickly battle with whatever guard force was present and in the midst of the fighting, some of them would seize berries. Then after about only a minute of carnage, before more of our own warriors could arrive as reinforcements, they would begin to make off with their looted berries. Pursuit was futile, as more of them would be lurking in the trees and the fortified posts beyond.

A few of the beetles inevitably fell during these assaults, and though they tried to fight to the death, the warriors were able to take some live captives as requested. When placed near one another and observed, they can signal one another through twitching and clacking. Some patterns have been observed by the princes studying the captives, but the work in deciphering the beetles' language is probably quite hindered by how the warriors had to bite off numerous limbs and large chunks of the beetles' mandibles to subdue them, and being maimed like that limits the beetles' ability to communicate. The beetles don't seem to have possessed any secrets that helped them to fare better in the rain; we presume that they simply don't mind the mud, live mostly above ground where flooding is less of a concern, and can swim better than we can anyways.

While all of this nonsense occurred, we were naturally tunneling in preparation for our surprise attacks on the ambush points and bunkers that they'd stolen from us during the rainstorm. That plan had its merits, but it also necessitated a fair amount of time and caution. Fortunately the beetles seemed content to maintain their tactic of encircling the satellite hive and occasionally raiding the berry bush; no doubt they thought that this siege tactic was weathering us down, but of course the satellite hive's underground connection to the main hive meant that secret supplies and reinforcements kept coming in with the beetles none the wiser. 

Interestingly, on a few occasions the warriors spotted gigantic beetles waiting behind the siege lines to receive the berries as an offering. These beetles are easily twice the size of their smaller peers, which range from equal to slightly larger than our own warriors, and they sport extra thick armor and even larger mandibles for it. Their bulk makes them quite intimidating; however, these giant beetles have never tried to partake in the raids and have never engaged us, which seems to rule out the initial suspicion that they'd developed a warrior type of their own. 

The bees buzzed overhead throughout this entire standoff much as they always had; however, now that the hivemind understood the creatures' mannerisms better, it was clear that they were much more observant than we initially assumed. Though the drones always seem to be busy and occupied with their own tasks to the point of being oblivious to the ground, they in fact seem to break up their regular patterns and fly in different paths to investigate any battles or movements of interest. So they are certainly aware of our conflict with the beetles, but thus far have neither said nor offered anything.

Our preparations are now done. We've finished the tunnels and bred more drones to help replace some of those lost in the flooding, and numerous princes are standing by to command waiting armies of warrior drones to breach the last little bits of dirt separating them from the beetles' positions on the surface above. We could either give them the affirmative now, or stall a bit longer to do other things like request aid from the bees or reconsider our plans given this new knowledge of the mysterious giant beetles.