by Mike McCarty
of Ghattambah
It was a perfect operation … perfectly screwed up.
Everything that could go wrong had fulfilled its destiny of error with a degree of precision usually associated with Swiss watches. The entire enterprise had swelled from a mere fiasco into a catastrophe of potentially Biblical proportions.
It started when Dr. Maximilian Pazani, the head of Project: Colony, went through his laboratory on the island of Lanakha, collected all his files and notes on the project, and burned them in seven metal wastebaskets. Next, he crushed his computer’s hard-drive with a sledgehammer, as well as his digital recorders, which held spoken notes on his experiments. Finally, he drank three bottles of beer, dug through his bedroom closet until he found his .38, and blew his brains out.
The only message he’d left behind–if indeed it could be considered a message–was scrawled on the mirrored door of the medicine cabinet in his bathroom. On the upper third of the mirror, he had traced two curved, vertical lines, four inches apart, in shaving cream. One curved to the right, the other to the left.
Out in the jungle, busy insect mandibles clacked and chattered in the moonlight.
Eight hours and twenty-three minutes after they were pronounced man and wife, Bobbie and Brandon Anderson were shaken awake by rough hands in the middle of the night–not the sort of thing one would expect in the honeymoon suite of a four-star hotel. They found five soldiers armed with machine-guns standing over their king-sized bed.
The Andersons, an attractive, athletic couple, both red-haired and in their mid-thirties, were already exhausted from their airplane trip and a marathon lovemaking session. Bobbie sighed with exasperation as she pulled the blanket up to her neck. “Damn! Do you have any idea what time it is, you guys?”
One of the soldiers, a tall, middle-aged man with a blond buzz-cut, said, “Sorry, can’t be helped. You know how it is. Big emergency. World in danger, blah blah blah. Now please get dressed.”
Bobbie clutched the covers more tightly. “Can you at least leave the room so we can have a little privacy?”
“Sorry, no can do,” the blond man said. “We have orders not to let you out of our sight.”
“What if we refuse to cooperate?” she said, pulling the covers over her head.
“Let’s just do what they say,” Brandon said. “We’re on the payroll, you know. I’m sure they didn’t cook up this emergency just to bug us.” He looked up at the military men. “Can you at least lower your eyes so you’re not looking right at us? I mean, we’re naked, okay? Honeymoon. You get the picture.”
Later, in the cargo plane, Bobbie and Brandon sat blindfolded while the tall, blond soldier, Master Sergeant Calvin Hullett, briefed them on their mission.
“We’re headed toward Lanakha, an island whose exact location is known only to three-dozen people,” he said. “That’s where Dr. Maximilian Pazani had been working on Project: Colony for the past thirteen years. The doc shot himself in the head. Guess the stress was too much for him. He didn’t leave a suicide note–but he did leave a sort of message in the bathroom.” He then described the faint soap-residue image that had been discovered on the mirror.
“Have any idea what that was all about?” Bobbie asked.
Hullett shrugged. “Not a clue. He’d been developing a new species of insect–one with a pretty crazy mix of arthropod characteristics.”
“Like what?” Brandon asked.
“Well, like cockroaches, they enjoy eating feces and garbage, but their favorite foodstuff is rotten animal flesh,” Hullett said. “They’ve got venomous stingers and diaphanous wings, like bees. Their bodies are long and multi-segmented, with plenty of legs, like centipedes. They have long antennae and multifaceted fly-eyes, too.”
“They sound charming,” Bobbie said. “I want one for Christmas.”
“That’s not all,” the soldier added. “They live in huge, lumpy hives they build out of masticated plant-pulp, like wasps. A full-grown specimen measures around eight inches long and three-quarters of an inch thick. At least, that’s the description Dr. Pazani gave the government in his last report, during the eighth year of the project. He was incredibly secretive–and he had friends in high places. He called the bugs his Maximillipedes.”
Bobbie laughed. “Wow, an actual mad scientist. I thought they were just in the movies.”
“Here’s what I don’t understand,” Brandon said. “What does the government have to do with any of this?”
“Who do you think funded the project? The sting of one of those things can kill a two-hundred-pound man within five seconds. Plus, under specific conditions, they can breed thirty-four times faster than the most prolific housefly. They’re killing machines.”
“You’ve got that right,” Bobbie said. “So how did this Dr. Pazani plan on stopping them from killing–well, everybody?”
“The doctor also developed small, insect-like flying robots, about the size of almonds, to monitor his creations,” Hullett explained. “These mini-bots were capable of transmitting a specific frequency of radio waves that could cause the Maximillipedes to die instantly.”
Brandon scratched a spot on his ear. “This blindfold is chafing me. So what’s the problem? Why are we being brought into all this? Why don’t you just tell the mini-bots to destroy the monster bugs?”
“Here, I’ll loosen it … but just a little.” Hullett adjusted the red-haired man’s blindfold. “Dr. Pazani never told his contacts what conditions would cause his creatures to breed at top speed. And he never told them what frequency would destroy them. The Maximillipedes live in enormous nests scattered throughout the jungles of Lanakha, but back when the doctor was alive, nobody was worried. His mini-bots could destroy them at any time. Now the mini-bots can’t be found anywhere.”
“So what are we supposed to do about it?” Brandon asked. “We’re just a couple of scientists.”
“Top scientists!” Bobbie’s voice lilted with pride. “And assassins!”
“Which of you is the better assassin?” Hullett asked.
“Me! I always get my man,” Bobbie said.
“No, dear, I’m afraid it’s me,” Brandon said. “I have more focus. Nothing can sway me or distract me. You can be distracted. That’s all there is to it.”
Bobbie pouted. “I supposed I am a little more … scattered. I’m better than I used to be, but still not perfect.”
Hullett smiled. “Oh, now don’t be so hard on yourself. You’re tough! Spunky! I wish I had a wife like you. Lorraine won’t even step on a spider.”
“Are we being brought in to...stomp your spiders?” Brandon asked.
“You only need to stomp one big spider,” the soldier said. “They’re social insects, remember? According to Dr. Pazani’s old report, each hive had over a dozen egg-laying queens, but the entire island was the domain of a single super-queen. He called her the empress, and she keeps all the hives in line. Without her, they’d all be at war with each other.”
Over the plane’s sound system, a low male voice announced, “We are now approaching Lanakha.”
“Can you take the blindfolds off now?” Bobbi said.
“Not just yet. Basically, between the two of you, you’ve studied speleology, cytology, geology, teratology–hell, you know your own credentials. You two have what it takes to find and kill the insect empress, and destroy any empress eggs they might have stashed away. You’ll have soldiers to help you and all the weapons you could possibly need. Without an empress, the Maximillipedes will turn on each other and the whole mess will be solved.”
Brandon shrugged. “Or you could just blast the island back to the Stone Age.”
“Tempting thought,” Hullett said, “but the island is too close to a fault line. If we nuked it, the explosion could set off earthquakes in China. Also, there’s an ancient temple on the island and th
e big boys don’t want that destroyed.”
Bobbie’s eyebrows arched over her blindfold. “Treasure?”
“She’s all about the bling!” her husband said.
The Master Sergeant laughed. “Well, she’s right! The big-boys figure it’s full of priceless artifacts. So, we’ve been told not to enter it. They know how much we make–they probably figure we’d pocket any diamonds or pirate gold or whatever the Hell they think is in there. But you know, they didn’t say anything about you two going in. If you think the empress is holed up in there–hey, be my guest. Now, time to take off those blindfolds and strap you into your parachutes.”
It was mid-morning when they touched ground in a wide, circular clearing, and Bobbie and Brandon were greeted by a dozen soldiers.
“Look at the trees,” Bobbie said. The leaves of most of the palm trees were severely shredded, as though they’d been attacked with machetes.
“Yeah, them bugs mean business,” said a burly, gray-haired soldier with a puffy scar running from just below his left eye to his chin. “I’m Sergeant Ross. You want to take a look at the munitions dump? Got some flame-throwers, grenades, rocket-launchers, you name it.”
“Well, we don’t want to open fire on them,” Brandon said. “Hullett said these things can breed like crazy under certain unknown conditions. Maybe loud noises are a factor. We don’t know.”
“Yow!” Ross said. “Hadn’t thought of that! Guess that’s why they told us to wait for you guys, huh?”
“I’m not a guy,” Bobbie said with a smile. “Any sign of the bugs yet?”
“Nope!” The soldier nodded toward the nearest trees. “One of my men thought he saw something over there, but it turned out to be some kind of big jungle cockroach. We were told these bugs made big hives, but we haven’t seen any. And we haven’t seen any animals. No monkeys, not even a rat. Now listen for a moment...”
They all stood still, listening.
“I don’t hear anything,” Brandon said.
“Exactly! A jungle island with no birds squawking? That can’t be right.” The soldier pointed to a path leading through the trees. “Let’s head toward the lab. That’s where we’ve set up camp. You two must be starving. You like pancakes? Private York is pretty handy with a frying pan.”
At the lab, the newlyweds enjoyed a big breakfast of pancakes, sausages, toast and coffee.
“Hullett said there’s a temple on the island,” Brandon said. “Is it near here?”
“About a quarter-mile away,” Ross said. “None of us have gone inside. We’re not supposed to. But Hullett said you two can check it out, and if you need us in there, then we can go, too.”
Bobbie refilled her coffee cup. “This temple...Anybody know what religion it belongs to?”
“It’s sure as Hell not Roman Catholic!” said Private York as he brought a fresh plate of sausages to the table. He was a tall, thin young man with sky-blue eyes and a light wisp of a moustache. “It’s got freaky-assed carvings on all the pillars. Looks crazy.”
Bobbie turned to her husband. “Your old girlfriend Sarah used to have a freaky ass. Maybe the natives worshipped her. You sure did!”
Brandon just smiled and shook his head.
“I’ve got some ideas about that temple,” York said. “Now, some of those carvings I mentioned, they look like...like...” He rolled his eyes upward as though looking into his brain, trying to find the right words. “...like a cross between an eggbeater and an octopus. And a caterpillar! And some other weird shit, too.”
“Private, watch your language,” Ross said. “There’s a lady present.”
“Sorry, ma’am!” the young soldier said.
“Please, just think of me as one of the guys,” Bobbie said. “Hell, I’ve probably killed more men than all of you combined!”
“Now, honey,” Brandon said to this pretty bride, “it’s not nice to brag.” He turned to York. “But I will say, she once strangled an enemy agent to death with a loop of his horse’s intestines. It’s a funny story, really. She–”
Bobbie lightly punched her adoring groom in the arm. “Careful! If you tell him too much, I’ll have to kill him!”
“Oops! Glad you stopped me.”
After breakfast, Ross told Bobbie and Brandon that it was time to take them to the temple. Bobbie wanted to hear York’s thoughts about the temple, so she requested that the young private accompany them. “When you were talking about the carvings, you mentioned you had some ideas...” she reminded him as they made their way through the thick foliage.
“Yep! I think that temple used to be some kind of alien base of operations,” he said. “The island god looks way too weird and complicated.”
“The boy makes a good point,” Ross said. “But I don’t know if I go in for the alien theory. Still, our research team tells us that the thing in the carvings is far different from any deity that has ever been worshipped before. The creature is pretty damned complicated, like York said. It has a–how do I put this?–a futuristic quality. Seeing an image like that in an ancient carving is like finding the ‘Mona Lisa’ painted on a caveman’s wall.”
“You know what else is weird?” York said. “We haven’t seen any of Pazani’s crazy bugs yet, but we’ve looked at pictures from that old report he filed. The thing reminds me of those freaky-assed bugs.” He pointed up ahead. “We’re almost at the temple.”
The party rounded a curve in the path and suddenly, the temple loomed before them. It was a huge, roughly conical structure, made from slabs of cream-colored stone covered with detailed carvings. The entrance of the structure was a narrow archway with a sheet of greenish-yellow metal for a door. A slab of the carved stone was set into the ground in front of the doorway.
Brandon walked up to the temple and ran his fingertips over one of the carvings. “This looks like it was done by some sort of precision machine. That seems to support the alien base theory.”
York nodded. “Yep, it has to be aliens. No other possible explanation.”
Ross took a look at the carvings, stooping so that his eyes were just a couple inches away from the stone. “I have to admit, no island native could have created this. The incisions into the stone are too deep and intricate. And they look … recent. Fresh.”
Bobbie examined the metal door. “What kind of metal is this? Not a spot of rust on it anywhere. And the color–I don’t think I’ve ever seen metal this color before. I wonder how this door opens? I don’t see any latches or handles…”
York joined her in front of the door. “It’s the damnedest thing I’ve ever seen,” he said. “They told us we couldn’t go in, but maybe that’s just as well, because we haven’t been able to figure out how anyone can get in or out without cutting through that metal sheet. I have no idea how thick it might be.”
“Good point,” Bobbie said. “Could be a quarter-inch thick … or, could be a foot thick.”
York pulled a jackknife out of his pocket and opened it. “Maybe it’s not very thick at all,” he said, jabbing the metal surface with the blade.
Instantly, a network of sparks crackled across the surface of the door. The door slid down into the floor–and then the stone slab in front of the door raised and tilted, tumbling Bobbie, Ross and York into the temple. The metal panel slid back up, sealing the entrance behind them.
“Oh Hell!” Brandon shouted. “That ain’t good! We’d better go in after them.”
“I’ll get some of my men out here to help,” Ross said. “I think we should get some hand grenades, too. A man should always have a couple hand grenades tucked away. This damned island! Once we rescue your wife and York, maybe we should nuke the place after all.”
Pain. Darkness. Silence.
Bobbie’s head hurt and she couldn’t see a thing. Her left knee also hurt–trying to bend it even a little sent shooting pains
through her body.
“York?” she whispered. “Can you hear me? I think my knee’s busted.”
No response.
In time she noticed what seemed to be a faint yellow glow in the distance. She squinted at it, not sure if it was just a product of her imagination. The glow grew steadily brighter and nearer, until at last she could see that the light was coming from a strange stone lantern, held in the air by–what? She had no idea what this strange being could possible be.
Heading toward her down a high corridor of cream-colored stone was an abomination worse than any fantastical devil from a Hieronymus Bosch painting.
The creature had a puffy, tubular body with a multitude of pincer-legs, like a caterpillar. It also had long, heavily veined spiral wings. Even though Bobbie was frightened and in intense pain, her powers of observation were still fully functional. She found herself wondering how any creature could fly with such an awkward body and misshapen wings.
The head of the monstrosity didn’t have a brainpan–it was just a gaping mouth filled with crooked, needlelike teeth. The thick lips were dotted with small, black eyes. At the base of the wings was a melon-sized, knobby hump. Bobbie figured, this had to hold the brain of the creature. A thick cluster of thick, lashing tendrils grew out of the top of the hump. The lamp was held up high by one of these tendrils.
Bobbie suddenly saw that York was walking behind the monster. He staggered a little, as though he were drunk. His face registered no emotion whatsoever. He simply stared ahead with complete disinterest.
The creature carefully set the lantern on the floor. York walked around the bizarre behemoth and came toward Bobbie.
“Welcome,” he said in a low, sleepy tone. “I see you are injured. The mini-bots will tend to your wound.”
Bobby looked down at her left leg. Her pants were ripped and soaked with blood. Her injured knee poked through the rip, revealing a long, swollen gash.
In a moment the air was filled with a high-pitched hum. A small cloud of small flying robots–Dr. Pazani’s mini-bots–flew down the corridor and settled on her knee. She tried to see what they were doing, but the light wasn’t strong enough. But after just a couple minutes, the pain was alleviated considerably.