A. Colucci - The Colony

“We’ve got to get out of here,” Paul cried, grabbing her hand.

“Where?” she yelled back, blowing out insects and staring at the circle of ants at their feet, which were rounding faster, moving in.

“This way!”

Kendra could barely see Paul, the air was so thick with wings.

Another sonic boom cracked the sky and they lurched back, straining to see the plane directly overhead. The raptor glowed silver against the dark universe. Giant metal flaps opened like wings and the shrill whistle of a falling bomb sounded.

“Kendra, get down!”

They both hit the deck, curling up like pill bugs with Paul draped over Kendra, both of her arms crisscrossing the back of her head. They waited for the bomb that would tear them to pieces, holding their ears and bracing for impact.

A deafening explosion blew open the sky in a rumble that echoed for miles. Kendra felt the ground shudder under her knees, and the strength of Paul’s body. Their ears were still ringing, when the world went silent for a moment. A soft wind blew over them.

Suddenly, Paul and Kendra were pummeled by an oily liquid.

It hit their bodies like an ocean wave and they slid across the roof, soaked and confused.

The plane was gone. They both sat up, feeling their wet limbs, making sure it wasn’t blood. Ants were running in frantic circles, zigzagging in no apparent direction, searching for queens that seemed to be everywhere and nowhere at once. Paul licked his lips and tasted soybean.

“It’s the pheromones,” he said, excited.

Already the armies were beginning to fight. Groups of ants were attacking each other. Large soldier ants were battling small workers, and workers were slaughtering soldiers; it didn’t matter. They tore each body limb from limb, unaware and unconcerned that they were colony mates committing their own form of genocide.

Dozens of aircraft were blazing over the horizon, and the sky was filled with ant-killing machines, strategically hitting their targets. The bombs would fall a hundred feet and then suddenly explode, dousing chemicals over a wide area. Behind the heavy planes were a fleet of crop dusters, blazing white under the moon and leaving contrails of pheromone that sprinkled to the earth and coated every skyscraper. Gray swarms of insects, covered in the sticky chemical, formed clusters of dark clouds all over the city, before plunging from the sky like a heavy rain. The ones that escaped flew head-on into buildings, attracted to the chemical like moths to a searing flame.

Kendra looked down at the ants breaking up into angry mobs.

“They’re dying,” she said.

“Yes,” Paul replied, but it was with sadness as much as relief.

Kendra felt it too.

They held each other, lost in their small corner of the world. Already it seemed like a dream, or more aptly, a nightmare. She smiled at Paul, realizing it was over and he was still standing at her side.

“So where do we go from here?” she said.

“You marry me, and I marry you right back.”

She liked the idea.

“Let’s get you bandaged.” Kendra took his arm and he leaned against her shoulder. Across the skyline, she gazed at the smoke drifting over the river. The buildings were becoming hazy. Kendra lifted a hand to her eyes but it felt heavy like lead. Sweat poured from her forehead and Paul watched helplessly as her body began to shake uncontrollably.

“Kendra?”

At first she didn’t hear Paul. He called her name again, but pain struck like a hammer to her brain. Kendra fell backward, with unfocused eyes. Paul grabbed her and stared frantically into her face. His lips were moving but his voice sounded far off, his words gibberish.

Something cold trickled over her lips. It tasted thick and sweet. Even before she put her fingers to her mouth, Kendra knew it was her own blood.

Bethesda, Maryland

THE HOSPITAL ROOM AT Walter Reed Medical Center in Maryland was overly bright and cheerful, painted in pastel blues and adorned with tall vases of fragrant white orchids, daylilies and pots of flowering cacti.

The curtains remained open all day and blinding light poured through the glass. The nurses complained it made the room hot and stuffy, but Paul insisted on sunshine every day. Kendra had thrived in the desert and she needed every ounce of strength while she was fighting for her life. He had brought her to Walter Reed because it had been transformed into the leading hospital for victims of Siafu Moto–related injuries, handling mostly patients in the armed services and medical profession, police and firefighters, as well as politicians, movies stars and the exceedingly wealthy.

The ants cut from Kendra’s back had indeed released their destructive enzyme, but the medications to treat her had masked all outward signs of what was going on inside her body. None of her major organs were destroyed, but her liver and kidneys had been damaged and some systemic arteries had hemorrhaged.

Paul listened to the steady beeps of the heart monitor. It was a comforting sound that he had wanted left on all the time. In the beginning, there had been a few close calls and twice Kendra needed to be resuscitated, which sank Paul into cycles of depression. But he always managed to fight it off and never left her bedside.

That was all in the past. Today was checkout day.

Dr. Bradley Collins, a wise old man with an aversion to smiling and releasing patients, gave Kendra the thumbs-up and told Paul to take her home. Although they had no real home anymore. The East Side of New York City would be shut down until the new year, and neither of them had any desire to return to Paul’s apartment on Park Avenue.

Paul had made other plans, which he hoped Kendra would find agreeable.

Wearing jeans and a red plaid shirt, he stood by her bedside, rocking slightly on the tips of his hiking boots. He kept a tight hold around Kendra’s hand and watched her sleep, his eyes dreamily tracing the perfect contours of her profile from the tip of her nose, to her rosy pink lips and the point of her chin. Kendra’s cheeks had filled out and she’d gained weight from four months of bed rest. She was self-conscious of the sudden plumpness on her bottom and around her middle.

In a Marilyn Monroe way, Paul had told her.

Her skin was light as porcelain. Paul frowned. Kendra seemed unusually pale, and he hoped it wasn’t a relapse. Dr. Collins had been honest with them, having seen thousands of similar cases. The enzyme could lay dormant for months and without warning begin eating away at this organ or that. It was like a new form of cancer, not yet explored or understood.

Paul knew even one more day in the hospital would greatly upset his wife. His wife . It sounded good and he rubbed his left thumb over her ring. They had exchanged the same gold bands from their first wedding in a bedside ceremony weeks ago.

Kendra’s eyes fluttered open.

Paul leaned in to kiss her cheek. “Hey, Rip Van Winkle. Third nap this morning.”

“Sorry,” Kendra said faintly and stretched her body like a cat. “I was dreaming of fast food.” Tacos. French fries. Caffeinated soda. Chocolate. It was all just minutes away. She licked her dry lips and smiled at her husband. There were dark smears under his lids, but his creamy brown eyes still sparkled brightly. His face had been cleanly shaved for months but now he sported a sexy five-day growth.

CNN was broadcasting from a television hanging on the ceiling. The world, as it turned out, never learned of Operation Colony Torch and never knew how close it had been to being hit with nuclear bombs. General Dawson had gotten through to President Davis before his demise, and the entire affair was covered up, blamed on an imaginary ecoterrorist group called Earth Avengers.