Micro

She laid the point across his forearm. She caught the point in his skin, over a vein, and pushed it in. Not too deep. Then she gripped his hand, and leaned over him. “Rick…”

For a few moments, nothing happened. She was beginning to wonder if she had given him enough-but then he gasped. His breathing sped up. She touched his neck, and felt his pulse racing. The venom was hitting him hard.

There was an explosive sound: Rick gasped, and dragged air into his lungs. Then he went into a seizure. His gaze flew around wildly and he strained upward against her, eyes staring, body trembling. She lay across him, holding his arms down, but afraid to press on him too hard. He gasped, taking huge lungfuls, hyperventilating as his spine arched. She threw her weight on him, trying to pin him down, fearful that he would hurt himself.

He groaned. And then his hand whipped out and fastened around her neck. He gripped her throat, his fingers squeezing, closing her throat off.

He was trying to strangle her. He hated her that much.

But then his fingers relaxed, his grip softened. He released her throat. He ran his hand over her shoulder. The touch became a caress. His hand worked up the side of her neck and under her ear, passed lightly over her skin, and his fingers opened and ran through her hair. Now she was kissing him and the great thing was that he was kissing her back.

She broke off, finally. “Does it hurt, Rick?”

“Hurts…like…hell…” he croaked. “I…could…get to like it.”

She helped him sit up. He was dizzy, and almost toppled over, but she held him, keeping her arms around him, talking softly to him, telling him everything would be all right. “You saved my life, Rick. You saved my life.”

Danny sat there watching Rick and Karen make up to each other, feeling extremely uncomfortable. In his opinion, this kind of stuff did not advance the effort to get back to Nanigen. He needed a doctor as soon as possible. He glanced down at his arm and almost threw up. The grubs seemed fatter than ever.

In a little while, Rick was able to stand. They began to walk. They went into the bamboo forest, where stalks of bamboo soared like redwoods. They made their way through it, and broke out onto a stunning view. They were facing the Great Boulder on the lip of Tantalus Crater, and looking down into the crater.

The crater extended beneath them, a basin stuffed with rain forest, rimmed by bare ground and patches of stunted, wind-wracked trees. All around the crater, peaks of the Ko‘olau Pali fingered into boiling clouds, and the wind pummeled the scene. At the foot of the Great Boulder lay Tantalus Base.

The base would have been virtually unnoticeable to a person of normal size. There was an aircraft runway about three feet long. At least Karen felt pretty sure it was a runway: she could see a dashed line and taxi markings. Beside the runway stood a cluster of miniature buildings made of concrete. The largest building seemed to be an aircraft hangar. The other buildings were smaller, and looked like bomb shelters. The buildings were embedded partway in the soil and were lightly covered with dead leaves and plant debris, so they blended into the micro-terrain.

Karen stopped. “Wow, Rick!” she said. “We made it!”

He turned his head and smiled, and looked at her. She rubbed his hands, his arms, to get the circulation going.

“Your hands feel warmer. You’re getting better I think.”

They didn’t want to draw attention to themselves, because they didn’t know what to expect from the inhabitants of the base, Nanigen employees who might well be following orders from Vin Drake. They decided to watch the base for a time, looking for activity. They lay down under a mamaki plant. The Great Boulder loomed above like a mountain.

There was no activity on the runway. The place seemed deserted.

The runway was strewn with stones, dried mud, plant debris. A cone of dirt had risen next to it, an ant nest. An ant trail extended across the runway and headed downslope toward the bottom of the crater.

“It doesn’t look good,” Danny Minot whispered.

Karen’s heart fell. If no micro-humans lived here, then there wouldn’t be any shuttle to Nanigen, and no chance of help. This place hadn’t been tended to; it had been overrun by ants.

But there might be airplanes.

They walked slowly down the hillside and went into the hangar. There were tie-downs for aircraft, but no planes. While Rick sat and rested with Danny, Karen explored the base. She found a room that she guessed had once held mechanical parts and supplies, but it had been emptied out, leaving bent metal pins and bolts protruding from the walls and floor. She went into another room. Empty. The next room contained living quarters. It had been flooded by rain and was half-filled with mud.

There was no sign of human life anywhere. Tantalus Base had been abandoned. There was no sign of a road to Honolulu, either. No shuttle truck. No airplanes. Only the trade wind endlessly worrying the ground and whistling through the empty halls of Tantalus.