Mandibles Read Online Free PDF

dead parrot. He'd had an on-again, off-again relationship with one of his fellow entomologists since then, but romance was no longer a high priority in his life. He had his bugs.

He walked into the small convenience store, grabbed himself a Snickers bar and a bottle of unsweetened iced tea, and went up to the cashier, a young guy, probably a college student. "Could you tell me where Trexler Road is?" he asked.

"Sure thing," said the cashier. "That's right off Independence Parkway. You'll need to keep going west on Kennedy until you pass the Westshore Mall, and once you're there -- "

"Just a second," said Dustin, taking a small notepad out of the breast pocket of his flannel shirt. "I'd better write this down."

"Oh, it's pretty easy."

"Not for me it isn't."

The cashier grinned and gave him the directions, double-checking Dustin's notepad to make sure he'd written it down correctly. "So did you just move here or are you on vacation or what?"

"Business."

"Cool. What kind of business?"

"Ants."

"Ants? Hey, I've got ants all over my yard. Me and my roommates are just renting the house, so it's not a big deal, but I was wondering the best way to get rid of those things. One of my roommates heard that you should pour boiling water all over their mounds, but he burned himself and didn't finish. That's just an old wives' tale, right?"

Dustin shook his head. "Actually, that can work. You need to use about three gallons of hot water on each mound, but it kills the ants and collapses the inside structure of their nest. I'd say it works about half the time."

"Really? I'll have to try it tonight. So what do you think is the best way to get rid of them?"

"Depends on the kind of ant. My specialty is RIFA, the Red Imported Fire Ant."

"Who the hell would import those things?"

"It wasn't done on purpose. They were brought from South America in the 1930's because they ended up in soil that ships used for ballast."

The cashier frowned. "And ballast would be...?"

"Stuff they used as weight to stabilize the ships," Dustin explained.

"Ah, okay. I think I heard that before."

"So, anyway, the ants ended up in Mobile, Alabama, started thriving, and now they've spread all over the southern United States and probably your yard."

"Bastards."

"Well, the queen _is_ kind of a tramp."

The cashier paused to ring up a young woman's purchase, and then returned his attention to Dustin. "So, seriously, what's the best way to get rid of those things?"

"In my opinion? _Pseudacteon tricuspis_."

"Is that poison?"

"Phorid flies. The females are attracted to fire ants. They zip down, quickly inject an egg into the ant's body, then zip away before the ant knows what happened to it." Dustin demonstrated this with enthusiastic hand gestures. "Then the egg develops in the ant's thorax for about ten days, sort of like in _Alien_."

"Cool. Does it burst out of its stomach?"

"Worse. The larva moves into the ant's head. Then the head falls off and the larva uses the decapitated head as its home for the next month."

"Nasty."

Dustin smiled. "Wonderfully so."

A pair of sleazy-looking guys in jeans and leather jackets that looked way too heavy to be wearing in this weather entered the convenience store, and Dustin decided that he should probably be on his way. "Anyway, good luck with the hot water treatment."

"Thanks. If you need to borrow somebody's yard for your research, especially those flies, let me know."

"Will do."

The cashier rung up his candy bar and drink. Dustin paid him, thanked him for the directions, and headed for the door. One of the sleazy-looking guys, freakishly thin with a heavily pockmarked face and dirty brown hair stepped in front of him, blocking his way.

"Going somewhere?" the guy asked.

"Well, out that door was my intention," Dustin said. Or would have said, if his mouth hadn't gone completely dry.

Dustin heard a gasp, and turned around to see the second sleazy guy, who was slightly