CENSUS_What Lurks Beneath Read online

  Dave instead gestured to the nearby couch. She shook her head no, but at the same time took in the ever-growing swarm of ants surrounding the house and felt the trembling in her arms at the effort required to continue training the heavy flashlight, and only slightly less, the heavy gun.

  She chewed her lip as she considered the couch, as well as the typical responses to this atypical question—art, music, etc.—passed through her mind. She wasn’t sure that an objective, alien race, would find a lot of value in what mankind had accomplished, particularly in light of all of the readily available evidence of its destructive side. She also didn’t have much to say about art and did not play an instrument.

  A selfish answer occurred to her. “I’m not going underground.”

  Dave nodded and again invited her to sit. To the relief of her trembling forearms she relented, a little, and wagged the end of her gun at Dave, indicating that he should move to the other couch so she could have the wall at her back. He nodded and moved. She warily moved past the coffee table, keeping an eye on Bill, and sat on the far end of the couch. She positioned the flashlight so that its light illuminated most of Dave, and then wagged her gun again, this time at Bill, encouraging him to move over so that he too would be in the light. Bill smiled, took a few steps closer to Dave’s couch and stopped.

  “We need the opposite from you,” Dave said, “We need you to keep your job and act as you always have. We’ve grown much stronger over the past year —“

  Bill cut in, “And we’ve done enough experimentation that we now know what we need to do to achieve the desired results.”

  She recoiled, physically and mentally at an image of a cave with naked women pinned down to the ground by millions of ants that scurried through their every orifice.

  “It’s not like that,” Dave added.

  She blinked and realized that he’d responded to the unspoken image in her head.

  “At least, it won’t be for you.”

  She dropped her head and stared at her once-again slender frame. “And assuming I can even have a baby at my age, how do I, who don’t even have a boyfriend, start walking around

  pregnant?”

  Dave came closer still and held out his hand. “With our help, you’re still young enough to bear many offspring, and one of the other benefits of the Colony is a long life, free of disease and suffering. We can also help make your life more comfortable. Perhaps you’d like to be Sheriff ?”

  She stared at his hand. “I thought you said workers only lived four months?”

  “You’re not a worker ant, you’re our human queen. Your pregnancies will be quick, and you’ll have only a modest weight gain before each birth. Having another one of us in law enforcement is important to the Colony. We need to be able to protect ourselves.”

  “Another?”

  “You don’t think the DNA tests and crime scene reports related to my death really passed muster on their own, do you?”

  He moved his outstretched hand even closer. “Will you join us?”

  Her mind blazed with contradictory emotions. She turned and stared at the throng of ants surrounding the house. She wasn’t sure she truly believed any of this, but she did believe that shooting them would bring the ants down upon her in waves. Something was holding the ants back, for now.

  She shifted and stared at Bill—who she didn’t like in any form. He smiled again in response and she could feel the touch of all the ants he apparently preferred to keep in a swarm around his head, and involun- tarily cringed. As she did a new thought occurred to her. If she agreed she’d soon become far more valuable to the Colony than Bill. As the human queen, she could dictate the life span of those that served her, as long as she worked for the good of the Colony. In the future she’d be the one doing the threatening, and those ants milling about his smiling face could just as easily chew it off.

  She surprised herself a little with the violence behind the thought, and the entire debate going on within her head. It felt like someone else was participating in her thoughts, and that idea made her turn back to Dave, who slowly nodded in return. She turned back to Bill, who finally stopped smiling, nodded slightly, and did something to make the ants retreat from his head.

  “There’s another emotion you won’t have to worry about.” She turned to Dave, “What’s that?”

  Dave stared at her, willing her to comprehend him. “Sadness. You will never feel sad again.”

  She thought about that for a moment. Though she did her best not to think about it, she’d been sad most of her adult life, particularly toward the end of her marriage. Her food compulsion had been one of the ways she’d tried to address it, and although she’d slowly made progress on that front, she’d also found herself stuck with a lifelong prescription to an- tidepressants. The dosage and the particular drug involved would likely change over time, but it didn’t look like she’d be able to live without a constant fix of chemical-delivered numbness.

  Dave smiled. “I was sad too. I thought all I really wanted was peace—to be left alone. Everything I did just seemed to complicate things further.”

  She nodded back. Her life, sans a spouse, children, dating and any sig- nificant interests, was about as simple as she could make it—and she was miserable. A troubling thought occurred to her, “What replaces the sadness?”

  “Gratification for service performed on behalf of the Colony. I can’t describe to you what it feels like to truly belong.”

  “That sounds like a cult.”

  He smiled, “There’s a reason people join cults.” He looked toward the mass of ants waiting just outside the threshold. “And there’s also the reality that you’ll have real power for the first time in your life.”

  She followed his gaze and the idea occurred to her that they could come in and join them. She didn’t want them touching her, and she envisioned a buffer zone around the couch she sat on. Within seconds, that’s exactly what occurred. Her flashlight played over the deep carpet of ants and for the first time she saw that there were actually several different types of ants of various colors and sizes, apparently sharing the same space— something that just didn’t happen in what she would have typically called the real world.

  She stared at the unreal setting in front of her, her mind scrambling to adjust to this altered state of reality. For some reason she thought back to the urban myth of asking someone if they were a cop because, if they were, they had to disclose it. Not true, of course, but as a corollary she wondered if asking herself if she was going crazy was a symptom of madness, or instead a sign that she still had control over her faculties.

  Her life up to now was well on its way to being a non-event. Fighting for the status quo seemed like an odd choice when given the chance of being part of something bigger, being wanted and, for perhaps the first time in her life, being important.

  “Why me?”

  Dave nodded, as if he’d expected the question. “We don’t experience love, but we do have a form of devotion we express through our work. That was part of why the Colony wanted me, as that is how I was wired to begin with.”

  She stared at him, thinking through the continuous flurry of activity she’d seen from him at every turn. This time it was her turn to nod.

  He continued, “I am devoted to you, and we think that will help all of us in your transition, and our future.”

  She looked again at the throng of ants pulsing just a few inches from her boots.

  How did I get here?

  What am I doing?

  Dave just smiled. He knew her thoughts but had the decency not to flaunt that fact. She waffled, but then realized that there was something they’d missed in this conversation.

  She stared at Dave. “You said that there was something else I really wouldn’t like. Something …challenging.”

  This time Dave did not smile but instead frowned. “Yes. You’re right.”

  She waited for him to continue but it was Bill that spoke. “Dave is here because he agreed to
willingly join the Colony in return for freedom from influence for his family.”

  “Adam.” Dave specified. “Yes, Adam.”

  She nodded.

  “The other part of his deal is his promise to follow through on this new path for the Colony and, specifically, he promised that he could get you to willingly join us.”

  She shifted her gaze to Dave and he nodded weakly. “And if I do not?”

  Dave nodded to Bill, who nodded back. Dave spoke softly, carefully. “If you refuse, you won’t leave this house.”

  She winced but then thought,

  I already knew that.

  Dave nodded his understanding and continued. “The Colony will then go after Adam as they had previously planned and it is unclear what will become of me.”

  A thought from Bill came into her head, “You know exactly what will happen to you.”

  Dave nodded again. The ants all around them clicked and twitched in anticipation.

  She took a moment to digest all of this. Then it was her turn to speak slowly, carefully. “So, you made a bargain to free your son that was con- tingent upon my entry into the Colony.”

  Dave nodded.

  “You don’t even know me! And that is not a fair thing to ask of anyone!” His thoughts entered her mind.

  I know you better than you know yourself. You are all I’ve thought about for

  the last year—even before that. You have to trust me. There is more I can tell you but I can’t do it here. There are more possibilities, potentially fantastic possibilities, that you and I can explore together. I know it’s not fair. I know this is an awful choice to force on you, but please trust me. I do still feel love, and I love you.

  Her eyes widened slightly, but she intuitively knew to avoid blurting something out in front of Bill. Bill’s eyes tracked between the two of them. Shut out of the exchange, he might still think that Dave was waiting to respond.

  On cue, Dave held out his hand. “I do know you, and if you will help me now, I pledge to always serve you—my Queen.”

  Bill smiled, the ants on his chest swirling.

  She looked at Dave’s hand, then his eyes, and then took his hand in her own.

  About the Author

  Marshall and his family moved to Costa Rica in 2015. They live atop a small mountain in the northwest part of that beautiful country. Mar- shall is also the author of the children’s book, ”Will of the Hill,” and is currently working on the first of a series of young adult novels. When not writing, he can be found volunteering at a local mechanic’s shop, working in local gardens and butchering the Spanish language.