The Colony: A Novel (21 page)

Something grabbed her ankle. It was Paul, reaching through the hatch door and shouting something, but Kendra couldn’t hear anything over the ants. The elevator buckled and swayed and then there was the straining sound as the cable’s hanger began to give way. Smoke poured from the engine and then it shorted out with loud popping sounds and a burst of flames.

“Hold on—we’re going down!” Paul shouted.

Kendra held her breath, trying to make herself lighter. There was a thunderous snap as the pulley broke loose and the elevator began to free-fall.

Two corner wires snapped under the tremendous weight and the bulky car jammed against the narrow walls, metal against brick, slowing down its plunge and sending more showers of sparks into the air.

The ladder shot out from beneath Paul’s feet and his legs kicked helplessly in the air. His body halfway through the hatch, he held tight to the center cable and pulled Kendra toward the hole, dragging her across the roof and over broken cable wires.

Kendra cried out, tumbling through the hatch with Paul and hitting the floor, just as the elevator slammed to the bottom with a crash.

CHAPTER 34

PAUL AND KENDRA LAY
flat on their backs in utter silence. The light flickered twice but didn’t go out. Paul was badly bruised, but remarkably, nothing was broken. Kendra too was banged up, but in one piece. They sat up nursing their aching bones. Paul unzipped his hood and flipped it from his sweaty head.

A shot of pain hit Kendra in her lower spine and she arched her back with a grimace.

Paul crawled to her. “You okay?”

“I think.” She threw off her hood and blinked hard. “Great. I lost a contact lens.” With a hopeless breath, she patted the floor.

Paul slowly got to his feet and limped to the door. He pressed all the buttons on the wall, but the elevator moaned like a beached whale. He tried to pry the doors apart but they wouldn’t budge. “We might be stuck here a—”

“Unnngh!” Kendra cried.

Paul dropped to her side. “What?” he cried. “What’s broken?”

She rolled onto her stomach, one hand reaching toward her lower back. “
Here,
” she winced.
“Shit. Shit. Shit.”

There was a thin tear in her suit, about the length of a pin, where the piece of cable had caught exactly onto the wrong spot, right along the zipper. It was the only part of the suit not made of woven steel.

Paul released the zipper and lifted her blouse. There was a streak of blood and … something else. He could feel his eyes bulge. “Listen to me, Kendra,” he shouted over her moans. “There are a whole bunch of ants on your back.”

“Well get them off, damn it!”

Paul reached for the backpack, knowing that any attempt to scrape the insects off by hand could leave the stingers intact. He took one huge breath to steady his nerves and fumbled through the pouch for his medical bag as his calm-doctor demeanor took over. He pulled out a scalpel.

“I need you to stay as still as possible.” He tried to steady her writhing body, climbing over her hips and straddling her legs, pressing a hand down between her shoulder blades.

Six ants were gathered in a row across the lumbar spine, clamped tight, as blood trickled between the vertebrae. A red rash covered Kendra’s back like welts from a flogging.

Paul could see the stingers working frantically up and down, and sprayed the area with an antiseptic that numbed the skin. The plan was to scrape the ants away with the edge of the blade, but the little bastards clamped on like Gorilla Glue, metal lodging between armor and skin. Three of the ants had already tunneled their way inside. He’d have to slice them off. Holding tight to the scalpel, Paul pushed the point a quarter inch into the flesh.

Kendra groaned as he started cutting, scooping out small chunks of tissue. She hissed through gritted teeth while Paul scraped the flesh into a glass vial, along with the ants, which locked on tight with a scissor-like grip. After the last of the ants was removed, Paul tried to control the bleeding with gauze and closely inspected the wound, making sure he removed every last bit of stinger. Even detached from the ant, a stinger could continue pumping poison into its victim and kill an allergic person in minutes.

And Paul knew Kendra was allergic to fire ants.

Gently, he turned her over, and immediately he knew there was a problem. Kendra’s pale face was feverishly hot and her eyes were droopy.

“Look at me, Kendra,” Paul mouthed the words loudly. He grabbed the medical bag and pulled out a syringe and two glass vials. “Don’t close your eyes, baby. Talk to me. I need to know—have you been taking your shots?”

He wasn’t getting any response. Cold sweat dripped from her forehead and her teeth chattered from severe chills. “Have you been taking your shots?” he yelled in her face. He tapped her cheek lightly and her eyes fluttered open.

She nodded and whispered, “Yes.”

Kendra had been giving herself shots of H-1 blockers for years, but it seemed to offer no protection against the Siafu Moto toxins. Her breathing became labored. Anaphylaxis was setting in fast.

Paul filled the syringe, striking the glass with two quick pings to get the bubbles out. The normal dose of epinephrine was .3 milligrams but he gave her twice the amount. He filled another syringe with an antihistamine. It was a dangerous thing to do, mixing large amounts of medications, but it was a last resort if she didn’t respond to the first dose, and she hadn’t.

As the needle jammed her arm, Kendra’s lips were turning blue and a hissing like a tire leak sounded from her mouth, signaling her throat was swelling shut.

All at once Paul was enraged with himself. How could he have taken such a risk? The truth was, he never seriously believed the ants could hurt them. That kind of thing happened to amateurs, not award-winning scientists. Paul knew ant behavior like the back of his hand and could anticipate any situation. But this time, things were different. They were dealing with something paranormal. Again, ego had gotten him in the worst predicament of his life.

“Stay with me, honey!” Paul took her pulse. It was 140 and rising. She was slipping away. Paul was not a religious man but he found himself praying, hard. He cradled Kendra in his arms and pressed his cheek against her forehead, feeling her skin burn with fever.

Come on, baby. Don’t do this to me.

Paul was panic-stricken. There was nothing he could do if she slipped into a coma. He laid Kendra gently on the floor and stood up, tense, shaking his fists with frustration, and let out an angry grunt. He began kicking in the door with all his might. He pounded the metal with his shoes until a sharp dent cut the door and the soles of his feet burned.

Paul gave up his fight and fell to his hands and knees. Kendra’s body lay still beneath him and he turned from her swollen white face. It was over, he couldn’t believe it. This was how it ended, right here, so suddenly. Tears filled his eyes.

There was a gasp of air.

He turned to her, startled. Kendra was breathing. Not just breathing, but moving.

Paul was overwhelmed with relief as Kendra curled up in a ball, hacking on a sudden influx of oxygen. He lifted her head and reached into his bag for the inhaler, and then shot two doses of antihistamine into her lungs.

She took hungry breaths.

Paul brushed the tangled hair from her wet face. The swelling began to subside and color came to her cheeks.

“Was I … dead?” she asked.

Paul shook his head with a smile, relieved beyond words.

Kendra inhaled deeply through her nose and began to breathe normally. Paul helped her to sit up against his chest and their hands clasped tightly together. She nestled against his shoulder, suddenly freezing, teeth chattering, but his chest felt warm.

She asked, “So now what do we do?”

“We wait. I hold you and we sit here together. We wait until the drugs finish working.”

She nodded, not wanting to ask,
What if they don’t?

“Let’s make a deal,” he said. “You don’t die on me and I won’t die on you.”

“Ever?”

“At least for today.”

They sat for a while, saying nothing.

“Hey,” she said at last, and plucked something off the ground. “I found my contact lens.”

Paul laughed and blew off the lens, helped put it back in her eye.

“Friggin’ ouch,” Kendra snarled, reaching behind her suit and drawing back fingers laced with blood.

“I had to cut the ants off your back.”

Kendra caught sight of the scalpel on the floor, smeared red with bits of flesh. She picked it up and raised a brow. “You enjoyed this, didn’t you?”

“What—playing doctor with you?” He pressed his fingers into her abdomen, looking for signs of soft tissue, and whispered, “I always have.” He sprayed the wound again with a soothing antiseptic and put on another layer of gauze and tape. “No sign of internal bleeding, but you’re not in the clear yet. Do you feel dizzy? Weak? Thirsty?”

She shook her head, squeezing her hands together to keep still. His warm breath sent chills up her neck.

“Nausea? Chills?”

“Yes. I mean no. I’m fine.”

Paul finished dressing the wound. He put several layers of surgical tape over the rip in Kendra’s suit.

She watched his hands tremble as they packed away supplies.

“That should hold.”

“You were worried.” Kendra smiled.

“Yeah,” he said and turned serious. “I thought you were gone. It’s the worst thing I ever felt in my life.”

She smiled and her fingers stroked his cheek.

“Don’t ever scare me like that.”

Kendra suddenly jumped to her feet with fluttery movements. “You know, I actually feel great. So much
energy.
” Not able to keep still, she shifted on her feet like a boxer, blowing out long breaths.

“What’s the matter?” Paul asked with concern.

“Nothing,” she said, her eyes shifting wildly. “I feel great. Really, really, really great.” Her pupils were dilated and she seemed hyper-alert.

Paul was a little worried, baffled by her quick recovery. He wondered if it was the immunotherapy or the drugs he administered, or maybe some kind of miracle. He decided he didn’t care.

She slammed the door with both her fists over and over and then thrust her knuckles into the panel of buttons on the wall.

Ding.
The elevator doors parted to the bright lobby, and the sound of Siafu Moto.

CHAPTER 35

THE COLONY POURED DOWN
the stairwell like black torrential rain. Churning rivers of ants slid down the steps and dangled in ropes between the railings. A second army shot up from the basement and joined forces at the front entrance.

Paul stumbled to his feet and slammed the button to close the door. It didn’t. He knelt down and shook the backpack, scattering supplies all over the elevator floor. The gun spun into the corner. “We’ll have to make a run for it! As fast as we can! Right over them! Out the front door,” he said in rapid fire over the noise of the ants.

Kendra zipped her hood and grabbed the bug vacuum. She looked angry, revved up, raising her chin with defiance and pointing the nozzle straight ahead. She stepped out of the elevator. “Not without a queen.”

The drugs are making her loopy, Paul thought and flipped his hood. He followed Kendra into the lobby, but then retreated, still unnerved by her accident. Realizing there was no way he could chance losing her again, Paul took a breath and stepped out of the elevator, easing up behind Kendra.

She hit a button on the bug vacuum and the nozzle elongated.

The ants suddenly surged toward them like a tsunami.

Paul prepared for the most terrifying experience imaginable. He closed his eyes and knelt down with his hands on guard, but the suspense was too great. So he turned to Kendra, who was staring wide-eyed through the plastic window, unable to believe what she was seeing.

The ants parted. They broke into regiments and formed a wide ring around the two stunned scientists. The colony began circling them in unison.

New reinforcements filled the lobby and swarmed the elevator. The room darkened as ants covered the track lighting above and two lamps on a table. They spilled across sofas and chairs and a large framed wall mirror, where Paul briefly caught his reflection before it disappeared. The wallpaper, a pattern of pink roses, became black. He squinted through the plastic window of his hood. Beads of sweat covered his face and stung his eyes as he braced for the onslaught.

Just don’t panic, he told himself, hoping he didn’t do something crazy again, like rip off his suit. “Kendra,” he said aloud, “don’t panic!”

She wasn’t listening, but was intensely focused on the only corner in the room completely undisturbed by the crazed colony. A potted dwarf palm stood under the bright beam of a single bulb. Paul followed her line of vision and saw it too.

Kendra was staring at one leaf, and on that leaf, something was staring back.

The mammoth queen stood motionless, except for the slow snapping of her mandibles. It was her enormous size that made her so conspicuous, like the tail of a rattlesnake, along with her threatening stance, as if she were standing on hind legs, like the striking position of a praying mantis. The queen stretched her abdomen and opened her mandibles in a roar, as if straining to smell her prey through their thick white shells.

“Is that—?” Kendra signaled to Paul, pointing the bug vacuum at the plant.

He blinked away the sweat in his eyes. “It can’t be.”

“But it is,” she replied. “Just hold steady. We won’t see luck like this for the rest of our lives.” Kendra stepped forward, toward the queen.

The colony surged.

The assault was so quick Paul thought the ants magically appeared on him. He had barely sucked in a breath when they covered his legs. They swarmed the body of his white suit to the zippered neck without giving him a second to react. By the time Paul let out a gasp, they blanketed the head cover. The sound rang in his ears as they raced across the window, inches from his face. Paul staggered backward, crying out to Kendra, but he could see only bits of light between flurries of a thousand legs. The weight of the ants, over eighty pounds, was unexpected and he dropped to his knees. He managed to brush the window free long enough to see a five-foot mound of ants in front of him. Then he realized it was Kendra, encased by the colony.