long-distance expeditions. It only remained for them to signal 'Look out, danger', in the vicinity of the trap.
They put the incident out of their minds and set off again along the scented path with the trail pheromones pointing the way. Once they had crossed the thickets, they carried on westwards, always at an angle of 23° to the sun's rays. They only stopped to rest when it got too cold or too hot. They had to act quickly if they were to avoid being caught up in a war on their return.
Explorers had returned to find their city surrounded by enemy troops before and it was never easy to force the blockade.
At last they came across the trail pheromone showing the entrance to the cave. Heat was rising from the ground. They plunged into the depths of the rocky earth.
The deeper they went, the more clearly they could discern the trickle of water. It came from a fuming, hot-water spring, from which rose a strong smell of sulphur.
The ants quenched their thirst.
At one point, they came across a strange-looking animal: it looked like a ball on legs but was really a dung-beetle pushing along a sphere of dung and sand with its eggs safe inside. Like Atlas in the legend, it was carrying its 'world' on its back. When the ground sloped down, the ball rolled of its own accord and the beetle followed. When it sloped up, it wore itself out pushing and sliding and often had to go back down to the bottom to retrieve the ball.
The Belokanians let it pass. It did not have a very nice taste and its shell made it too heavy to transport anyway.
To their left, a dark silhouette scurried off to hide in a crevice in the rock. This time, it was something really tasty, an earwig. The oldest explorer was first off the mark. She tipped her abdomen over her head, took up the firing position balancing on her hind legs, aimed instinctively and fired a drop of 40 per cent formic acid from a distance. The corrosive liquid sliced through the air.
A hit!
The earwig was struck down in its tracks. It was strong stuff] Formic acid stings at forty parts per thousand, so at forty per hundred, it really shifts things! The insect collapsed and they all rushed to devour its burnt flesh. Last autumn's explorers had left behind good pheromones. There seemed to be plenty of game in the region. It would be a good hunt.
They went down into an artesian well and terrorized all sorts of underground species they had never come across before. A bat tried to cut short their visit but it took flight when they enveloped it in a cloud of formic acid.
As the days went by, they continued to comb the hot cave, piling up the bodies of small white animals and pieces of pale-green fungus. They laid down new trail pheromones with their anal glands so that their sisters would be able to hunt there without mishap.
The mission had been a success. The territory had pushed an arm way beyond the western scrub. As they were about to set off on their return journey, heavily laden with food, they planted the chemical flag of the Federation. Its scent flapped in the air: 'BEL-O-KAN'.
'Sorry, I didn't quite catch that.'
'Wells. I'm Edmond Wells's nephew'
The door opened on a man over six feet tall.
'Mr Bragel? Forgive me for disturbing you but I'd like to have a word with you about my uncle. I never knew him and my grandmother told me you were his best friend.'
'Please come in. What do you want to know about Edmond?'
'Everything. I never knew him and wish I had.'
'Oh, I see. Edmond was always a bit of a mystery, anyway. He was that kind of man.'
'Did you know him well?'
'Can we ever really know anyone well? Let's just say we often found ourselves in each other's company and neither of us minded.'
'How did you meet?'
'At university, in the Biology Department. I was working on plants and he was working on bacteria.' 'Two parallel worlds.'
'Yes, except that mine's far more savage.' To underline his point, Jason Bragel indicated the mass of green plants filling the dining
They put the incident out of their minds and set off again along the scented path with the trail pheromones pointing the way. Once they had crossed the thickets, they carried on westwards, always at an angle of 23° to the sun's rays. They only stopped to rest when it got too cold or too hot. They had to act quickly if they were to avoid being caught up in a war on their return.
Explorers had returned to find their city surrounded by enemy troops before and it was never easy to force the blockade.
At last they came across the trail pheromone showing the entrance to the cave. Heat was rising from the ground. They plunged into the depths of the rocky earth.
The deeper they went, the more clearly they could discern the trickle of water. It came from a fuming, hot-water spring, from which rose a strong smell of sulphur.
The ants quenched their thirst.
At one point, they came across a strange-looking animal: it looked like a ball on legs but was really a dung-beetle pushing along a sphere of dung and sand with its eggs safe inside. Like Atlas in the legend, it was carrying its 'world' on its back. When the ground sloped down, the ball rolled of its own accord and the beetle followed. When it sloped up, it wore itself out pushing and sliding and often had to go back down to the bottom to retrieve the ball.
The Belokanians let it pass. It did not have a very nice taste and its shell made it too heavy to transport anyway.
To their left, a dark silhouette scurried off to hide in a crevice in the rock. This time, it was something really tasty, an earwig. The oldest explorer was first off the mark. She tipped her abdomen over her head, took up the firing position balancing on her hind legs, aimed instinctively and fired a drop of 40 per cent formic acid from a distance. The corrosive liquid sliced through the air.
A hit!
The earwig was struck down in its tracks. It was strong stuff] Formic acid stings at forty parts per thousand, so at forty per hundred, it really shifts things! The insect collapsed and they all rushed to devour its burnt flesh. Last autumn's explorers had left behind good pheromones. There seemed to be plenty of game in the region. It would be a good hunt.
They went down into an artesian well and terrorized all sorts of underground species they had never come across before. A bat tried to cut short their visit but it took flight when they enveloped it in a cloud of formic acid.
As the days went by, they continued to comb the hot cave, piling up the bodies of small white animals and pieces of pale-green fungus. They laid down new trail pheromones with their anal glands so that their sisters would be able to hunt there without mishap.
The mission had been a success. The territory had pushed an arm way beyond the western scrub. As they were about to set off on their return journey, heavily laden with food, they planted the chemical flag of the Federation. Its scent flapped in the air: 'BEL-O-KAN'.
'Sorry, I didn't quite catch that.'
'Wells. I'm Edmond Wells's nephew'
The door opened on a man over six feet tall.
'Mr Bragel? Forgive me for disturbing you but I'd like to have a word with you about my uncle. I never knew him and my grandmother told me you were his best friend.'
'Please come in. What do you want to know about Edmond?'
'Everything. I never knew him and wish I had.'
'Oh, I see. Edmond was always a bit of a mystery, anyway. He was that kind of man.'
'Did you know him well?'
'Can we ever really know anyone well? Let's just say we often found ourselves in each other's company and neither of us minded.'
'How did you meet?'
'At university, in the Biology Department. I was working on plants and he was working on bacteria.' 'Two parallel worlds.'
'Yes, except that mine's far more savage.' To underline his point, Jason Bragel indicated the mass of green plants filling the dining
Similar Books
Fallen Angels
Natalie Kiest
Detective
Arthur Hailey
My Everything
Heidi McLaughlin
Caught Up in the Drama
Reshonda Tate Billingsley
Eleanor
Mary Augusta Ward
Light My Fire
Abby Reynolds
A Tiger's Treasure (Tiger Protectors Book 2)
Terry Bolryder
As Though She Were Sleeping
Elias Khoury
Knight's Castle
Edward Eager
Thrasher
K.S. Smith