### 22

The creature’s sharp proboscis misses you by inches. Before it can strike again, you prise yourself out of the cluster and retreat back along the stamen until you are out of harm’s way. Blindly the giant insect stabs and slashes, splintering stamen tips and drenching you with showers of sticky pollen. Fortunately, the span of its gigantic wings and the narrowness of the plant’s corolla conspire to prevent it from reaching deeper into the plant, and you are able to escape without injury.

You retreat all the way down to the bowl of the corolla, from where you began your ascent. Looking around you see that the hollow stem is now the only remaining chance you have of getting out of this plant alive.

Turn to 103.