Micro

There were so many ants, and each ant seemed filled with inhuman energy. One ant by itself certainly didn’t pose a danger, but thousands of them…excited…hungry…Despite the threat, the young scientists couldn’t help gazing at the ants with fascination. Two ants stopped and tapped their antennae together, and then one of the ants began wagging its rear end and making a rattling sound. The other ant obligingly vomited a droplet of liquid into the other’s mouthparts. Erika explained what was going on: “She was begging food from her nest-mate. She wagged her rear end and made those scratchy sounds to say she was hungry. It’s the ant’s version of a dog’s whine-”

Danny interrupted. “I fail to see the joy of watching an ant blow lunch into another ant’s mouth. Let’s go, please.”

The ant highway wasn’t very wide. They could have easily jumped over it, but they decided to avoid the ant column rather than risk trouble. As Peter put it, “We don’t want an ant to latch on to someone’s ankle.”

Jarel Kinsky had stopped, and he was staring up at the branches of the great buttressed tree, which soared over their heads. “I know this tree,” he said. “It’s a giant albesia tree. There’s a supply station on the other side of it, I’m pretty sure.” He clambered up onto a root, and walked along the root for a distance, and hopped down. “Yes,” he said. “I think we’re getting close.” Kinsky took over the lead from Peter, and began heading toward the left around the albesia tree, pushing his way through dead fern leaves, striking at things with a grass-stem spear, knocking leaves and plants aside.

Peter Jansen dropped back to the rear. He had not liked the look of the ants and wanted to keep an eye on them as the group moved along. Rick Hutter was the last in line, moving slowly with the pack on his back, carrying the chinaberry, and holding his spear. “Hey Rick, can I take your spear for a while? I’ll bring up the rear,” Peter said.

Rick nodded, handed him the spear, and kept walking.

Kinsky, meanwhile, dragged a leaf aside, and said loudly, “If we can get back to Nanigen, we’ll have to find the hidden console so we can operate the generator, even if Mr. Drake doesn’t want-” At that moment Jarel Kinsky froze in his tracks. Ahead in the distance, beyond the roots of the tree, stood the peak of a tent.

“A station! A station!” Kinsky shouted, and he started running toward the tent.

He didn’t see the entrance of the ant nest.

It was an artificial tunnel, fashioned from bits of glued dirt, emerging from the base of a palm tree. Kinsky ran right past the tunnel mouth. Standing around the tunnel, in guard positions, were dozens of bigheaded soldier ants. The soldiers were two to three times larger than the workers. Their bodies were dull red, covered with sparse, bristly hair. Their heads were gleaming black and massively oversized, packed with muscles and plated with armor, and fitted with mandibles designed for fighting. Their eyes were black marbles.

They spotted Kinsky as he ran toward the tent.

Instantly all the soldiers charged. Kinsky noticed the giant ants running toward him, and he swerved. But the soldiers had fanned out. They converged on Kinsky, coming from different directions, a strategy that cut off his escape. Kinsky stopped running and backed up inside a closing ring of ant soldiers, holding his grass spear over his head. “No!” he shouted. He slashed at a soldier with the spear, but the ant grabbed the spear in its mandibles and broke off its point. Several soldiers darted in and began to pull Kinsky to the ground, while one ant closed its mandibles around Kinsky’s wrist. He shouted and shook his hand, whirling the ant around, trying to make it let go. But the ant had clamped on his wrist and was shaking its head, bulldogging Kinsky. His hand came off, and the ant flew away and hit the ground running, with the hand in its mandibles. Kinsky screamed and went down on his knees, cradling his severed wrist, which spouted blood. A soldier climbed up Kinsky’s back, fastened its jaws behind his ear and began tearing off Kinsky’s scalp. Kinsky fell to the ground writhing. Within moments the soldiers had him spread-eagled and were pulling on his arms and legs from different directions; they were drawing and quartering the man, attempting to tear him limb from limb. A soldier got its mandibles fastened under his chin, and his screams ended with a guttural noise as blood spurted from his throat and drenched the ant’s head. Smaller workers joined the attack, and Kinsky seemed to disappear under a pile of frantic ants.