You know, you and Inna really are kindred spirits when it comes to fiction. She writes of the malaise. You write of the brutality that hides it. Always blood with you, always death, even if metaphorical, with her. But can you really have one without the other?

I do wonder though, who makes the shots. Maybe that is the true issue within the Hive, that there is no one to actually make the calls, and yet, they keep waiting for the move forward, but it will not come.

Though yes, the mechanical separation from labour, how Marxist of you ;-) Though the next step is the one where you do not need the dumb beasts, just the machinery, but as this asks, is it machinery? And what will the people do? Because really, if they could have the GT, then they don't have these workers because they need them, but they keep the work undone fully in order to have something for these people to do.
Maybe they should've just truly droned them.

The question of language is an interesting one. So many interesting answers one could give here. But just like the above, which was an impressionist painting of motives and humanity borne out of what is, it's more to give ideas.