Empire of the Ants Page 4

  'He's in there. I'm sure he's in there,' sobbed Nicolas. 'We must go and get him.'

  As if in answer to this plea, they heard a fitful yapping coming from the cellar. It seemed to be a long way away.

  They all moved nearer the forbidden door. Jonathan blocked their path.

  'I've already told you you're not to go down into the cellar.'

  'But darling,' said Lucie, 'we've got to go and get him. He might be attacked by rats. You said yourself there were rats down there.'

  His face froze.

  'It's tough luck on the dog. We'll go and buy another one tomorrow'

  The child was flabbergasted.

  'But Dad, I don't want another one. Ouarzazate's my friend. You can't just leave him to die.'

  'What's got into you?' added Lucie. 'Let me go if you're afraid.'

  'Are you scared of going, Dad? Are you chicken?'

  Jonathan could no longer contain himself. He muttered, 'All right, I'll go and have a look,' and went to get a torch. He shone it through the crack. It was pitch-dark on the other side.

  He shivered, longing to run away, but his wife and son were pushing him towards the abyss. Sour thoughts filled his mind as his fear of the dark gained the upper hand.

  Nicolas burst into tears.

  'He's dead. I'm sure he's dead. It's all your fault.' 'He may be injured,' said Lucie soothingly. 'We ought to go and see.'

  Jonathan thought back to Edmonds message. Its tone was imperative but what could he do? One of them would inevitably crack in the end and have to have a look. He had to take the bull by the horns. It was now or never. He passed a hand over his damp forehead.

  No, it wasn't going to be that way. At last he had a chance to brave his fears, take the plunge and face the danger. If the dark wanted to swallow him up, so much the better. He was ready to get to the bottom of things. In any case, he had nothing left to lose.

  'I'm going in.'

  He went to get his tools and broke the lock. 'Whatever happens, don't move from here. Above all, don't try and come after me or call the police. Just wait for me.'

  'That's a funny way to talk. It's only a cellar, after all, a cellar like any other.'

  'I'm not so sure about that.'

  Lit on his way by the orange oval of the setting sun, the 327th male, last survivor of the first spring hunting expedition, ran on alone. Unbearably alone.

  He had been splashing through puddles, mud and mouldy leaves for some time. The wind had dried all his lips. His body was coated in amber dust. He could no longer feel his muscles. Several of his claws were broken.

  But at the end of the olfactory trail along which he was hurtling, he soon made out his objective. Among the mounds forming the Belokanian cities, one shape loomed larger with every stride. The enormous pyramid of Bel-o-kan, the mother city, was like a scent lighthouse attracting him and drawing him in.

  327th at last reached the foot of the imposing anthill and raised his head. His city had grown even bigger. The construction of the dome's new protective layer had begun. The summit of the mountain of twigs almost reached the moon.

  The young male searched around for a moment, found a ground-level entrance that was still open and dived in.

  He was just in the nick of time. All the workers and soldiers working outside had already returned. The guards were about to block up the exits to preserve the inner warmth. He had barely crossed the threshold when the masons set to and the hole closed behind him, with a slam.

  Nothing more could be seen of the cold, barbarous world outside. The 327th male was once more immersed in civilization and could merge with the soothing Tribe. He was no longer alone, he was manifold.

  Sentries approached him. They had not recognized him under his film of dust. He quickly emitted his identification scents and the others recovered their serenity.

  A worker noticed his scent of tiredness. She offered him trophallaxis, the ritual gift of her body.

  Every ant had a kind of pocket in its abdomen, a second stomach which did not digest food but kept it fresh and intact indefinitely. Food could be stored and regurgitated at a later date and passed into its 'normal' stomach for digestion or spat out and offered to another of its kind.

  The gestures were always the same. The ant offering trophallaxis accosted the object of its desire by tapping it on the head. If the ant approached in this way accepted, it lowered its antennae. If it raised them, it was a sign of refusal. It was not really hungry.

  The 327th male did not hesitate. His energy reserves were so low he was on the verge of catalepsy. They joined mouths and food came back up. The ant offering trophallaxis regurgitated first saliva, then honeydew and a mush of cereals. It tasted good and gave the 327th male a real boost.

  Once he had received the gift, the male immediately withdrew. It was all coming back to him now, the deaths, the ambush. There was not a moment to lose. He lifted his antennae and sprayed the information in fine droplets around him.

  To arms! We're at war. The dwarves have destroyed our first expedition. They've a terrible new weapon. Clear for action! War has been declared.

  The sentry withdrew. The alarm scents were grating on her nerves. A crowd was already gathering round the 327th male.

  What's the matter?

  What's happening?

  He says war's been declared.

  Can he prove it?

  Ants came running from all directions.

  He's talking about a new weapon and an expedition that's been decimated. It's serious. Can he prove it?

  The male was now at the centre of a knot of ants. To arms, to arms! War has been declared. Clear for action! Can he prove it?

  They all started repeating the scent question.

  No, he could not prove it. He had been in such a state of shock that he had not thought of bringing anything back with him. Antennae stirred. Heads moved doubtfully.

  Where did it happen?

  To the west of La-chola-kan, between the new hunting ground found by our scouts and our cities. It's an area often patrolled by dwarves.

  That's impossible. Our spies have returned. They state quite categorically that the dwarves aren't awake yet.

  An anonymous antenna had just emitted this pheromone sentence. The crowd dispersed. They believed it, they did not believe him. He sounded as if he were telling the truth but his story was so unlikely. The spring wars never began so early. The dwarves would have been mad to attack before they were even all awake. Everyone went back to work without taking heed of the information emitted by the 327th male.

  The sole survivor of the first hunting expedition was dumbfounded. He had not made up all those deaths, damn it! They were bound to notice gaps in a caste's ranks in the end.

  His antennae drooped stupidly on his forehead. He felt useless and degraded, as if he no longer lived for others but for himself alone.

  He shivered with horror at the thought, then rushed forward, ran about feverishly, roused the workers and summoned them to witness. But they scarcely stopped even when he repeated the time-honoured saying:

  I was the exploring leg

  I was the eye on the spot

  Now I’m home, I’m the nerve stimulus.

  No-one gave a damn. They listened to him without paying attention, then went away again without panicking. If only he'd stop trying to stimulate them.

  Jonathan had been down in the cellar for four hours now. His wife and son were sick with worry.

  'Shall we call the police, Mum?'

  'No, not yet.'

  She went to the cellar door. 'Is Dad dead, Mum? Did he die like Ouarzi?' 'No, darling, of course not. What a lot of rubbish you talk!' Lucie was dreadfully worried. She leant forward to look through the crack. Using the powerful halogen torch she had just bought, she thought she could make out a spiral staircase a little way ahead.

  She sat down on the floor. Nicolas came and joined her. She kissed him.

  'He'll come back. We've just got to be patient. He asked us to wait
, so we'll just have to go on waiting.' 'What if he never comes back?'

  327th was tired. He felt as if he were struggling in water. You move but you don't get anywhere.

  He decided to go and see Belo-kiu-kiuni in person. Mother was fourteen winters old and possessed of incomparable experience whereas the asexual ants who made up the bulk of the population lived for three years at most. Only she could help him find a way to get the information across.

  The young male took the express route leading to the heart of the city. Several thousand egg-laden workers were scurrying along the wide gallery. They were bringing their burdens up from the fortieth floor of the basement to the nurseries in the solarium on the thirty-fifth floor above ground level. The vast flow of white shells carried at leg's length was moving from below to above and from right to left.

  He had to go in the opposite direction. It wasn't easy. 327th bumped into several nurses who called him a vandal. He himself was jostled, trodden on, shoved and scratched. Fortunately, the corridor was not completely jammed. He managed to force a way through the teeming mass.

  After that, he made his way along small tunnels. It was a longer way round but the going was easier and he kept up a good pace. He passed from arteries into arterioles and from arterioles into veins and venules. He covered kilometres that way, going over bridges and under arches, through empty and crowded places.

  He had no difficulty in finding his way in the dark thanks to the infrared vision of the three simple eyes on his forehead. As he drew nearer the Forbidden City, the air grew heavier with the sickly sweet scent of Mother and the number of guards increased.

  There were ants there of every warrior sub-caste, every size and every shape; small ants with long notched mandibles; powerful ones with wood-hard thoracic plates; stocky ones with short antennae and gunners with tapered abdomens, brimful of convulsive poisons.

  Armed with valid passport scents, the 327th male passed through their screening posts without mishap. The soldiers were calm. You could tell that the big territorial wars had not yet begun.

  Very close now to his goal, he presented his ID to the doorkeeper ants, then entered the final corridor leading to the royal chamber.

  He stopped on the threshold, overcome by the unique beauty of the place. It was a large circular room built according to very precise architectural and geometrical rules handed down by queen mothers to their daughters, antenna to antenna.

  The main vault was twelve heads high by thirty-six in diameter (the head was the federal unit of measurement, a head being equivalent to three normal human millimetres). A few cement pilasters supported this insect temple. With its concave floor, it was designed so that scent molecules emitted by individuals would bounce off the walls for as long as possible before being absorbed. It was a remarkable olfactory amphitheatre.

  A fat lady was lying on her stomach in the centre, now and then waving a leg at a yellow flower. The flower sometimes snapped shut but not before the leg had been withdrawn.

  The lady was Belo-kiu-kiuni.

  Belo-kiu-kiuni, the last russet ant queen of the central city.

  Belo-kiu-kiuni, the sole egg-layer, who had engendered all the minds and bodies of the Tribe.

  Belo-kiu-kiuni, who had already been reigning at the time of the great war against the bees, the conquest of the termite hills of the south, the pacification of the spider-infested territories and the terrible war of attrition forced on them by the oak wasps. Since the previous year, she had also co-ordinated the cities' efforts to resist the pressure of the dwarf ants on the northern frontiers.

  Belo-kiu-kiuni, who had beaten all records for longevity.

  Belo-kiu-kiuni, his mother.

  This living monument was there beside him as before. Except that now she was being moistened and caressed by twenty or so servile young workers, when it had once been he, 327th, who had cared for her with his clumsy little legs.

  The young carnivorous plant snapped its jaws and Mother gave a little scented moan. No-one knew why she had such a passion for predatory plants.

  327th drew nearer. Seen close up, Mother was not very good-looking. Her head was elongated at the front with two enormous globular eyes which seemed to look all ways at once. Her infrared simple eyes were squeezed into the middle of her forehead. Her antennae, on the other hand, were set far too far apart. They were very long and light and vibrated in short, controlled bursts.

  Belo-kiu-kiuni had woken a few days earlier from the long sleep and laid ceaselessly ever since. Her abdomen, ten times the normal size, was shaken by continuous spasms. At that very moment, she released eight scrawny eggs. Pale-grey and iridescent, they were the latest generation of Belokanians. The round, sticky future escaped from her entrails and rolled into the room, where the nurses immediately took charge of it.

  The young male recognized the eggs' scent. They were sterile soldiers and males. It was still cold and the gland for producing 'daughters' had not yet been activated. As soon as the weather was right, Mother would lay eggs of every caste according to the city's precise needs. Workers would come and tell her there was a shortage of cereal crushers or gunners and she would supply them to order. It also sometimes happened that Belo-kiu-kiuni left her chamber to go and sniff the corridors. Her antennae were sensitive enough to detect the slightest shortfall in any caste and she immediately made up the strength.

  Mother gave birth to five more puny individuals then turned to face her visitor. She touched him and licked him. The moment of contact with royal saliva is always quite extraordinary. The saliva is not only a universal disinfectant but also a panacea for all wounds except those inside the head.

  If Belo-kiu-kiuni was incapable of recognizing a single one of her innumerable offspring personally, she showed by licking him that she had identified his scents. He was hers.

  The antenna dialogue could commence.

  Welcome to the Tribe's genitals. You left me but you can't help coming back.

  It was a mothers ritual greeting to her children. Having communicated it, she sniffed the pheromones of the eleven segments with a composure that impressed the young 327th. She already knew why he had come. The first expedition sent west had been completely wiped out. There had been scents of dwarf ants in the neighbourhood of the catastrophe. They had probably discovered a secret weapon.

  I was the exploring leg

  I was the eye on the spot

  Now I'm home, I’m the nerve stimulus.

  True enough. The only trouble was, he had not managed to stimulate the Tribe. His scents had convinced no-one. He felt that only she, Belo-kiu-kiuni, would know how to get the message across and raise the alarm.

  Mother sniffed him more attentively. She picked up the slightest volatile molecules coming from his joints and legs. Yes, there were traces of death and mystery. It might or might not mean war.

  She indicated to him that she had no political power anyway In the Tribe, decisions were made by constant consultation, through the formation of working parties which chose their own projects. If he wasn't capable of generating one of these nerve centres - in short of forming a group — his experience was useless.

  She couldn't even help him.

  The 327th male persisted. For once, as he was talking to someone who seemed willing to hear him out, he emitted the most seductive molecules with all his might. According to him, the catastrophe was a matter of priority. Spies should be sent immediately to try to find out about the secret weapon.

  Belo-kiu-kiuni replied that the Tribe was collapsing under the weight of 'matters of priority'. Not only was the spring awakening not yet totally complete but work on the city's skin was still in progress. And as long as the last layer of twigs had not been laid in place, it would be dangerous to go to war. On top of this, the Tribe was short of protein and sugar. Lastly, it was already time to think about preparing for the Festival of Rebirth. All this would take up everyone's energy. Even the spies were overworked, which would explain why his message of anguish couldn't
be heard.

  There was a pause. Only the sound of the workers' labia licking Mother's shell could be heard. She had started playing with her carnivorous plant again, contorting herself until her abdomen was wedged under her thorax and her two front legs were left dangling. When the plant's jaws clamped shut, she withdrew her leg promptly before taking him to witness what a formidable weapon it might make.

  We could raise a wall of carnivorous plants to protect the whole of the north-west frontier. The only trouble is, the little monsters still can't tell the difference between people from the city and strangers.

  327th returned to the subject uppermost in his mind. Belo-kiu-kiuni asked him how many individuals had died in the 'accident'. Twenty-eight, was the reply. All members of the exploring warrior caste? Yes, he had been the only male in the expedition. She then concentrated and laid twenty-eight pearls in succession.

  Twenty-eight ants had died and these twenty-eight liquid sisters would replace them.

  one day inevitably: One day, inevitably, fingers will turn these pages, eyes will read these words and brains will interpret their meaning.

  I do not wish that moment to come too soon. Its consequences could be terrible. And as I write these sentences, I am still struggling to keep my secret.

  However, people will have to know what happened one day. Even the most carefully guarded secrets come out in the end. Time is their worst enemy. Whoever you are, I want firstly to greet you. When you read these words, I shall probably have been dead for ten years or even a hundred. At least, I hope so.

  I sometimes regret having acquired this knowledge. But I am a human being, and if I now feel very little solidarity with others of my kind, I recognize all the duties incumbent on me for having been born among you, the inhabitants of the human universe. I must pass on my story.

  All stories resemble one another if you look at them closely. In the beginning, there is a subject in the making who slumbers. He undergoes a crisis which forces him to react and either change or die. The first story I am going to tell you is about our universe because we live inside it and because all things, large and small, are interdependent and obey the same laws.