Empire of the Ants (28 page)

When the second horn appeared, 4,000th darted forward and bit the eye with all the strength of her mandibles. She tried to sever it but the snail curled up, dragging the explorer inside its shell.

Gloop!

103,683rd thought hard. How could she save her companion? Then an idea sprang from one of her three brains. She seized a pebble in her mandibles and started to hit the shell with all her might. She had invented the hammer, but the snail's shell was not made of balsa wood and the knocking only made music. She had to think of something else.

It was surely her lucky day, for she now discovered the lever. She grabbed a strong twig and a bit of gravel to use as an axis, then leant all her weight on it to overturn the heavy creature. She had to have several goes but the shell at last wobbled to and fro before toppling over with the entrance uppermost. She had done it!

103,683rd climbed up the coils, leant over the well formed by the hollow shell and dropped onto the snail. After a long slide, her fall was broken by a gelatinous brown substance. Sickened by the greasy slime in which she was floundering, she began to tear at the soft tissue. She could not use acid for fear of dissolving in it herself.

Soon another liquid mingled with the slime: the snails transparent blood. The panic-stricken animal uncoiled in a spasm that flung the two ants out of its shell.

They were unharmed, but spent some time caressing each other's antennae.

The dying snail tried to get away but lost its entrails,
en route.
The two ants caught up with it and finished it off easily, terrifying the other four snails, who had put out their eye-horns to see what was happening. They curled up deep inside their shells and did not stir from them again for the rest of the day.

That morning, 103,683rd and 4,000th gorged themselves on snail. They cut it up into slices and ate it as warm steak in slime. They even found the vaginal pouch full of eggs. Snail caviar was one of the russet ants' favourite dishes and a valuable source of vitamins, fat, sugar and protein.

With their social crops full to the brim and stuffed with energy from the sun, they set off again at a good pace on the road leading south-east.

pheromone analysis
: (Experiment thirty-four). I have succeeded in identifying a few ant communication molecules using chromatography and a mass spectrometer. I have thus been able to undertake the chemical analysis of a communication between a male and a worker intercepted at 10p.m. The male had discovered a breadc
rumb. This is what he emitted: 6
-methyl.
^’

'4-methyl 3-hexanone (2 emissions).'

'Ketone.'

'3-octanone.'

Then again:

'Ketone.'

'3-octanone (2 emissions).'

Edmond Wells,
Encyclopedia of Relative and Absolute Knowledge

On the way, they met other snails. All of them hid as if word had got round that the ants were dangerous. There was one, however, who did not hide and whose body lay there for all to see.

Intrigued, the two ants went up to it. The animal had been crushed to pieces by something massive. Its body had burst and was spread over a wide area.

103,683rd immediately thought of the termites' secret weapon and realized they must be close to the enemy city. They examined the body more closely. It had been a sudden, extremely powerful blow. It was not surprising they had managed to smash the post of La-chola-kan with such a weapon.

103,683rd made up her mind. They must enter the termite city and study their weapon or, better still, steal it. The whole Federation might otherwise be annihilated.

Suddenly a strong wind blew up and they were sucked up into the sky before their claws had had time to cling to the ground. 103,683rd and 4,000th did not have wings but they flew just the same.

A few hours later, when the team on the surface had dozed off, the walkie-talkie crackled into life again.

'Hello, Madame Doumeng? That's it, we've reached the bottom.'

'Well? What can you see?'

'It's a blind alley. There's a concrete and steel wall that was built very recently. It seems to be the end. No, wait, there's another inscription.'

'What does it say?'

'How do you make four equilateral triangles out of six matches?'
'Is that all?'

'No, there are some keys with letters on them, probably to key in the reply'

'Isn't there a corridor at the side?'

'No, there isn't anything.'

'Can't you see the others' bodies either?'

'No, nothing, but there are some footprints, as if lots of feet had been stamped just in front of the wall.'

'What shall we do?' murmured a policeman. 'Shall we go back up?'

Bilsheim examined the obstacle carefully. All the symbols and steel and concrete plates were hiding some kind of mechanism. Besides, where had the others disappeared to?

Behind him, the policemen were sitting down on the stairs. He concentrated on the keys. You must have to type the letters in a particular order. Jonathan Wells was a locksmith and had probably copied the security systems of the entrances to blocks of flats. He had to find the code word.

He turned to his men.

'Anyone got any matches?'

The walkie-talkie lost patience.

'Hello, Inspector Bilsheim. What are you doing?'

'If you really want to help, try and make four triangles out of six matches. Call me back as soon as you find the solution.'

'Do you take me for a fool, Bilsheim?'

The storm at last abated. In the space of a few seconds, the wind slowed its dance. Leaves, dust and insects were once more subject to the laws of gravity and fell according to their respective weights.

103,683rd and 4,000th had been dropped on the ground a few dozen heads apart. They were reunited without injury and looked about them. They were in a stony region quite unlike the landscape they had left behind. There was not a single tree to be seen, only a few wild grasses scattered by the winds. They did not know where they were.

While they were gathering their strength to leave this sinister place, the heavens decided to display their might again. The clouds grew heavy and turned black. A flash of lightning split the air, discharging the static electricity which had accumulated in it.

All the animals understood this message from nature. Frogs dived, flies hid under pebbles and birds flew low.

Rain began to fall and the two ants needed to find shelter urgently. Every drop could be fatal. They hurriedly made their way towards the distant outline of a tree or rock.

Little by little, through the heavy drops and creeping mists, the shape grew clearer. It was neither a rock nor a shrub but a veritable cathedral made of earth with the tops of its many towers lost in the clouds. They realized with a shock what they were seeing.

It was a termite hill! The termite hill of the east!

103,683rd and 4,000th were caught in a trap between the terrible rainstorm and the enemy city. They had intended to visit it but in very different circumstances. Millions of years of hatred and rivalry were holding them back.

But not for long. After all, they had come this far to spy on the termite hill. Therefore they went on, trembling, towards a dark entrance at the foot of the edifice. With their antennae raised, mandibles wide open and legs slightly bent, they were ready to sell their lives dearly. However, against all expectation, there were no soldiers at the entrance to the termite hill.

It was very strange. What was going on?

The two asexual ants worked their way inside the vast city, their curiosity already getting the better of the most elementary caution. It was nothing like an anthill. The walls were made of something much less crumbly than earth, a mortar as hard as wood. The corridors were very damp. There was not the slightest draught and the atmosphere was abnormally rich in carbon dioxide.

They advanced inside it for 3°-time without encountering a single sentry. It was most unusual. The two ants stopped and their antennae met in consultation. It did not take them very long to come to a decision: they would go on.

But by now they were completely disorientated. This foreign city was a maze even more tortuous than the city of their birth.

Even the marker scents of their Dufour glands did not cling to the walls and they no longer knew whether they were above or below ground level.

They tried to retrace their steps, which did little to help the problem as they discovered more and more odd-shaped corridors. They were well and truly lost.

103,683rd then picked up an extraordinary pheromone, a light. The two soldiers could not get over it. This glimmer of light at the heart of a deserted termite city made no sense whatsoever. They made their way towards the source of the rays.

It was an orangey-yellow light, which sometimes turned green or blue. After an extra-bright flash, the light source went out. Then it came on again and started to flash, reflected by the ants' shiny chitin.

103,683rd and 4,000th made for the subterranean lighthouse as though hypnotized.

Bilsheim was hopping with excitement: he'd done it! He showed the policemen how to arrange the matches to make four triangles. At first, they were stunned, then they let out cries of enthusiasm.

Solange Doumeng, who had got caught up in the game, belched:

'You've done it? You've done it? Tell me how!' But he did not obey. She heard an uproar of voices mingled with mechanical noises, then once more silence. 'What's happening, Bilsheim? Tell me!' The walkie-talkie began to crackle furiously. 'Hello! Hello!'

'Yes
(crackling),
we've opened up the passage. There's a corridor
(crackling)
behind the door. It goes off to the
(crackling)
right. We're going in.'

'Wait! How did you make the four triangles?'

But Bilsheim and his men could no longer hear messages from the surface. Their radio loudspeaker wasn't working and had probably short-circuited. They could no longer receive anything but could still transmit.

'Its quite incredible. The further we go, the more building's taken place. There's a vault overhead, and a light in the distance. We're going on.'

'Wait, did you say a light, down there?' Solange Doumeng was shouting herself hoarse in vain.

'They're here!'

'Who's there, damn it? The bodies? Answer me.' 'Look out.'

They heard shots and cries then the line was cut off.

The rope no longer unrolled but remained taut. The policemen on the surface gripped it and pulled, thinking it was caught on something. Three of them pulled, then five. Suddenly it gave.

They pulled up the rope and rolled it up, in the dining room rather than the kitchen because of the gigantic coil it formed. At last they got to the broken end. It was ragged enough to have been gnawed by teeth.

'What shall we do, Ma'am?' murmured one of the policemen.

'Nothing. Nothing at all. Don't say a word about this to the press or anyone else and wall this cellar up as quickly as possible. The investigation is over. I'm closing the file and I never want to hear about this damn cellar again. Go and buy some bricks and mortar and be quick about it. And you can sort things out with the policemen's widows.'

Early that afternoon, as the policemen were about to put the last bricks in place, they heard a muffled noise. Someone was coming back up! They cleared a passage. A head emerged from the shadows, followed by the survivor's whole body. It was a policeman. At last they were going to find out what was happening down there. Fear was written all over his face. Some of his facial muscles were paralysed as if he had suffered a stroke and the end of his nose had been torn off and was bleeding profusely. He was trembling and his eyes were turned up. He looked like a zombie.

'Gebegeeeege,' he uttered.

There was dribble running from the corner of his mouth and he ran a hand covered in cuts over his face. To the experienced eyes of his colleagues, they looked like knife wounds.

'What happened? Did you get attacked?'

'Heebeegeeebegebegee!'

'Is anyone else alive down there?'

'Beegeegeebebeggebee!'

He was incapable of saying anything else so they dressed his wounds, shut him up in a psychiatric hospital and walled up the cellar door.

The slightest scratching of their legs on the ground caused the light to vary in intensity. It trembled as if it were alive and could hear them coming.

The ants stood still to make sure. The glimmer of light soon grew brighter until it lit up the tiniest crevices in the corridors. The two spies hid hastily to avoid being lit up by the strange projector. Then they took advantage of a drop in the light's intensity to make a dash for the source of the rays.

It turned out to be a phosphorescent beetle, a rutting glowworm. As soon as he spotted the intruders he went out completely. When nothing happened, he slowly glowed pale-green again, a cautious pilot-light.