The bug attacked while they were cruising down the alleys behind the auto wreckers in the warehouse district. It was a big one, maybe thirty kilos, and it was fast. It came charging out of the dumpster where it was foraging and went straight for the rear tires.
Perez floored it, and they felt as much as heard the impact when the bug pounced, too late, and hit the rear fender. But it must have got its claws around the corner of the wheel well or something, because Perez didn't see it in the rear-view mirror as he sped off. There was a bad grinding sound coming from the rear of the car.
"Shit," he said. "We're dragging it."
Jones reached behind the seat and pulled the electric cattle prod out of the equipment bag. She quickly checked to make sure the capacitors were charged, and then nodded to Perez.
"Whenever you're ready," she said.
Perez slammed the brakes on hard, and spun the truck sideways to disorient the bug. Jones was out the door before the pick-up had even stopped moving, and Perez heard the snaps of the discharging cattle prod as he climbed out, his taser gun drawn. Jones was good, though, and she had the thing immobilized before it could get to the gas tank or engine bay. Together they dragged it out into the light, being careful to avoid its twitching mandibles and #8-bit proboscis.
"Jesus, that's a mother," said Perez, counting eight articulated legs.
"It's beautiful," agreed Jones, wrapping bungees around the legs to hold them out of the way while she peeked under the armor plates for the proper nerve lines to cut. "Looks like it matches the bounty spec. Get my bag, will you?"
Perez grabbed her canvas backpack from the cab, and handed it to her. As she began searching through it, the bug gave a mighty twitch and flipped over onto its feet. Jones jumped back as its mandibles slashed wildly at its bindings. It went hopping and skipping down the alley, dragging the bungees and trying its damnedest to make a getaway. Perez scooped up the cattle prod and chased it down.
He dragged it back to her by the legs, cattle prod over his shoulders, looking for all the world like a caveman returning from the hunt. "Did it hurt you?"
"Nah," she said as she flipped on her logic analyzer and attached the ground clip to the bug's exoskeleton. Within the minute she had found the primary nerve corridor, and cut it with wire clippers. The bug's legs went slack.
Jones started unbolting dermal plates and removing legs. "God, this is great, look at this," she said, pointing to a dense collection of circuit boards tucked in behind the bug's fuel tank.
Perez shrugged. "Bug guts," he said.
"Separate neural nets for each leg, that's pretty innovative, don't you think? I've never seen that before. Looks like they were adapted from voice-recognition systems stolen out of cars. This is really great. It's probably a new species. What do you think?"
Perez spat on the base of a telephone pole, unable to share her enthusiasm. "Bug-us Jones-us," he said in his best imitation of Latin. "Can't wait to find its nest and kill its whole fucking family." He grinned at Jones' expression of disgust.
"It's people like you, Perez, that wiped out three quarters of the species on this planet," she said.
"Hey, it's my job. I'm an exterminator. Boss says kill the bugs, I kill the fuckin' bugs. It's your job too, don't forget."
"My job is to control bug migration and development so as to minimize interference with human activities."
Perez rolled his eyes. "Is that so, Dr.~Death?" He teased her with that moniker whenever she refused to admit her talent for killing. Fact was, none of the crew knew the chinks in bug armor like Jones.
"Shut up and help me lift this baby into the truck." They hoisted the partially dismembered bug into the truck bed, and tossed a few of its detached components after it.
"You know what the trouble with you academics is," began Perez.
"I don't want to hear about it."
"You think that any kind of extinction is bad, and that all kinds of conservation are good. Extinction is good, see? You think the extinction of the dinosaurs was bad? If it weren't for that, we wouldn't be here. Without extinction there can be no progress. That's how life works."
The corner of Jones' mouth twisted. "That's a killer, you telling me how life works. Spare me your rationalizations, Perez. Unless your idea of progress is ending up the only thing left alive on the planet, choking in your own shit, don't second guess nature and exterminate anything that's mildly inconvenient, okay?"
Perez raised his eyebrows and spat again. "Cool," he agreed. "Are we going to find that nest or not?"
Jones looked around. "Yeah, I guess." They both climbed back in the truck. Perez turned it around, and they began cruising back toward the dumpster that the bug had pounced from.
"Careful," said Jones. "The spec said these new ones attack in packs."
"Right on!" snorted Perez. "That I'd like to see. Who was the poor bastard who reported that?"
"City garbage crew. Five bugs attacked their truck and chased them off. By the time they got help, the truck was mostly stripped."
"That's hilarious! Did they track 'em down?"
"Nope. Never found them. They made off with a lot of high-power hydraulics and fuel."
Perez revved the engine as they got close to the dumpster, trying to coax any other bugs out. None came, so he parked the truck and they both got out, packs over their shoulders. Perez holstered his taser gun, and slung a goo gun with a two-liter magazine over his shoulder. Jones looked inside the garbage bin, and seeing nothing, climbed in.
"Goddam scientist," grunted Perez. "What the hell do you think you're doing?" Jones didn't answer, so he looked inside to see her rooting through soggy cardboard boxes and packing foam. She squealed with delight suddenly, as a little four-legged bug scrambled out of the light when she moved a box aside. Diving after it, she fought with garbage for a few seconds before emerging triumphantly with the little bug in her hands.
"Isn't it cute?" she grinned, a strip of packing tape stuck to her hair. "Ow! Stop that!" The bug was pinching her fingers, trying to free itself. It was constructed mostly from old tape deck motors and plastic mounting brackets. "Tetrapod. Looks like a derivative of the Frisco Garbage Gremlin. Hold it for a sec. I want to take some pictures."
Perez juggled the bug while Jones fished out her cam and took ten seconds worth of footage. Then he tossed it back into the trash bin, where it quickly climbed inside a paper bag. "I don't know why you like those goddam things so much," he said, wiping his hands on his pant legs.
Jones climbed out. "Some people like cats. Some like fish. I like bugs. Besides, I'll never finish my dissertation if I don't collect field data. Artificial life, Perez! Don't you think it's kind of magical?"
"They're a bunch of greasy parasites and thieves. They shoulda jailed that Jap who set them loose when his grant was cut." Perez looked around as if trying to spot something worth shooting.
"Konaka was a genius," retorted Jones, inspecting the bug footprints in the dust and decomposed newspapers at the foot of the garbage bin. "Where do you think our space program would be right now, if it weren't for his research into Von Neumann machines?"
"Yeah, yeah, tell that to the folks in Tokyo. I saw on TV the other day that a whole family was killed by a hunter pack that broke into their house. They ate the TV and stereo, and stole a kilowatt-hour of power." Perez was strolling idly down the alley, following a meandering set of wheel tracks.
Jones didn't answer. She had seen that story, too, and it had disturbed her in the way she imagined it would be like to discover that your fourth-grade teacher was a child molester. She had often entertained the notion that the bugs would eventually evolve towards intelligence, mutating through successive generations by replicating themselves with improper replacement parts. It would be a wonderful world, she had imagined, coexisting with these benevolent machines. We would be like gods to them, but we would be kind gods. They could work for us, but they would be free.
The Tokyo slayings had raised the possibility of violent strife, even wars between humans and bugs. The police had hunted down and destroyed the murderous machines within hours. A mass extermination program had been launched. If bugs ever did evolve intelligence, it wasn't going to be in Tokyo. Watching the news clips over and over, Jones had come to the belated realization that there were no free servants, and certainly no kind gods.
Perez whistled from down the alleyway. "Yoo hoo, Jonesie," he cooed in his worst falsetto. "Bug highway!" He was pointing at a peeled back section of chain-link fence that led into an auto-wrecking yard. The weeds and litter at the base of the fence were all trampled from the traffic that passed through the hole. The wrecking yard beyond the fence was prime territory for a bug nest. The only trouble was that the main gate, farther up the alley, seemed to be chained and locked shut.
Perez was pulling the broken chainlink back as Jones came up. They could easily squeeze through, but they would have to leave the truck in the alley. And of course there was the matter of getting permission from the yard owner to go hunting on his premises.
Perez slipped through the fence and started to follow bug tracks beyond a doorless Korean hatchback. "Where you going?" asked Jones. "We gotta call in first."
"Yeah, yeah," mumbled Perez. "This is reconnaisance. I'm not killing anything."
"You're still trespassing."
"Fucking tight-ass. Do you want to get the bugs, or do you want to fuck with red tape all day?"
"I don't want to lose my commission because you dicked with the procedure," said Jones. It had happened before, and Perez hesitated, considering this powerful piece of logic.
Suddenly the blare of horns and sirens filled the alley behind Jones. She jumped out to see the beacons and headlights of the company truck flashing wildly, as its security system tripped. The truck was rocking like it was full of manic children, and the alarm was shouting "Stand back from the truck! Stand back from the truck! Occupants will be stunned in fifteen seconds!" Jones caught glimpses of mechanical legs and other appendages flicking in and out of the engine bay and wheel wells.
Perez was quickly beside her. "How many?"
Jones shrugged. The security system boomed, "Stand back! Occupants will be stunned in ten seconds!" She and Perez stood passively, waiting for the system to send its thirty thousand volt spike through the chassis and bodywork. That was usually sufficient to fry any bugs that were trying to disassemble the vehicle. Worked well on people, too.
"Five seconds!" bellowed the security system. "Four. Three. Two." And then the truck shut up. The lights shut off, safety beacons stopped flashing, and the security system went silent. But the vehicle continued to pitch and rock.
"Christ," groaned Jones. "They cut all the power."
"Lucky bastards. Let's go!" said Perez. They were responsible for half of all damage to their truck, levied against future commissions. Fortunately the company trucks were all fortified against bugs, but that didn't mean they were invincible. It just meant the bugs took a little longer to finish their business.
Jones ran after Perez. "I left the cattle prod in the truck!"
Perez tossed her his taser gun. She juggled it to avoid the electrodes, not sure whether he had left the safety on. A check of the magazine revealed three remaining shots.
"You got cab and cargo bed," commanded Perez. "I got engine and gas tank!" He ran right up to a wheel well that had a bunch of legs protruding from it, and whacked off a couple rounds of the goo gun.
Jones looked through the open driver's side window and noticed a big octopod disassembling the dash. It had already completely removed the truck radio, and was working on the air conditioning system. Jones leveled the taser gun and pulled the trigger from a range of half a meter. The round popped audibly when it discharged, snapping the bug's legs straight and launching it into the windshield. The safety glass shattered into a million fragments, and the bug tumbled upside-down onto the seat, legs twitching spasmodically. Jones threw open the door, and dragged the bug out onto pavement. It was still fighting, but couldn't muster any coordination of its limbs. The shock of the taser shot must have cleared its memory or blown its feedback sensors.
She left the bug squirming on the ground and hopped up on the rear bumper. There were two bugs in the cargo bed, having a field day with the toolboxes and testing equipment. The carcass of the bug from the dumpster was also a subject of intense interest. Jones aimed and fired at the closest bug, catching it right on the carapace, just behind its monocular eye. The bug twitched, and then sprinted for safety, running right into a steel tool chest. It about-faced, and charged right into the tailgate. She had only managed to fry its visual circuits, and had to use her last taser shot to put it down.
The second bug didn't ignore this turn of events. It turned on her and raised its forelimbs, like a crab preparing to fight. It was similar to the bug from the dumpster, close to thirty kilos, and Jones wasn't willing to take it on without any more ammunition. She hopped off the bumper and backed down the alley. The bug scampered to the edge of the cargo bed to watch her retreat. Jones took a few more steps back, keeping her eye on the bug. With an unknown species like this, you couldn't be too sure of its pattern recognition algorithms. Bugs occasionally mistook humans for machines and tried to disassemble them.
The bug kept its attention on her, though. It hopped down from the truck and scuttled in her direction to get a better look at her. Jones froze and started to sing softly. This was usually enough to convince bugs that the subject of their attention was not of mechanical interest, and sure enough the bug stopped, reevaluating.
Jones could hear Perez cursing and kicking something around the other side of the truck, then the liquid whunk of the discharging goo gun. The bug in front of her remained fixed and staring at her from a few meters away. It was evidently having some difficulty deciding if she was worth the effort of disassembling. Either it was incredibly stupid and lacked the usual selection criteria for spotting machines, or else it was unusually intelligent, and the usual criteria were insufficient. Whichever, it wanted more data.
"Piss off!" said Jones, stamping her foot.
The bug perked up, and advanced a few steps. Jones swore softly. Evidently, she hadn't done the right thing. She relaxed and began to retreat again. The bug accelerated and resumed its pursuit.
"Perez!" screamed Jones. "I've got a tail!" She dodged the bug and ran back towards the truck, the bug trotting close behind. Perez whacked it as they passed by, and the bug tripped up, trapped in the goo gun's congealed ammunition. With the barrel of the gun, he flipped the bug over on its back and then methodically broke each of its legs with the heel of his engineer's boots.
Jones walked back toward him. "Take it easy. It isn't going anywhere."
"Piss me off," said Perez. "Peckers cut the brake lines, the ignition system, everything! They're getting so fast, we're not going to be able to stop them, soon."
"How many did you get?" asked Jones, looking under the engine.
"Jesus, at least five, I don't know," spat Perez. He shook his goo gun. "Just about drained it. Can't be more than a couple shots left."
"Don't worry about it. Your five plus my three, that more than covers the damage to the truck."
Perez sighed, nodding. "Yeah, I guess you're right. We're still gonna need a tow. I'll call in."
"Don't bother. The radio's trashed."
Perez rolled his eyes. "Coffee break, then." He tossed the goo gun into the cab, and pulled out his lunchbox.
Jones breathed deep, surveying the carnage. Eight bugs. That was rare for a single incident; bugs generally had little in the way of cooperative or social instincts. Nevertheless, coordinated attacks were becoming more common, as the Tokyo incident had shown. The most remarkable example of pack coordination was a recent riot in Mexico City. It involved an estimated one thousand bugs who laid waste to an industrial park during a three-day rampage that caused almost two hundred million dollars in damage. Academic circles were abuzz with all sorts of scientific speculation about cooperation and communication in this and other, similar, bug incidents. The subject was of intense interest to Jones. Her thesis was entitled "Communication via RF Interference in Von Neumann Insectoids".
She popped the hood, and looked around the engine compartment. Congealed goo covered everything, with the occasional trapped bug twitching stubbornly in its sticky grasp. "Jeez, Perez, you look like you were trying to ice a cake or something."
"I was cooking, that's for sure," said Perez, stuffing a muffin into his face. "Speaking of which, we can't go back for the nest until I get more ammo."
"It's a good thing you used the goo gun," decided Jones, still watching the writhing bugs.
Perez raised his eyebrows. "Let me guess: because it's non-fatal? Jones, you crack me up." Jones just shook her head; it was pointless even debating the topic with him.
They both looked up as another company truck turned into the alley, its safety beacons flashing. Head office would have been signalled when the security system tripped, and it was company policy to dispatch extra agents to lend assistance.
Perez swore under his breath. "Is that who I think it is?"
Jones nodded, "Malkovich and whatsisface."
"Bunch of cowboys." They both looked away down the alley, feigning disinterest.
"I shoulda known it was Bonnie and Clyde!" called Malkovich from the truck as he pulled up. His partner, Chan, giggled maniacally from the passenger seat. They jumped out, bristling with weaponry, and swaggered over with the relaxed gait of the self-important.
Malkovich let out a whoop of laughter when he looked at the engine. "Perez, you been jerking off again?"
Chan cackled, slapping his thigh. "That's it, Malkie! I bet Jones was giving one of her lessons in Bug Love!" The two of them exchanged ritual punches in the arm.
"Yeah," said Malkovich. "You two are redefining the meaning of buggery." Chan snorted with laughter, despite the fact that it had to be the oldest joke around.
"Shut up, you morons," growled Perez, closing his lunchbox and throwing it back inside the truck. "I need to borrow a magazine of goo."
"And two clips of taser shot," added Jones.
Malkovich pursed his lips and rocked back on his heels. Chan nodded enthusiastically, looking back and forth between Perez and Jones. "What's up?" said Chan.
"Nothing's up," said Perez. "One bug got away, and we gotta hunt it down."
"Yeah right, one bug," said Malkovich softly. "Two litres of goo and a dozen tasers for one bug. That's some serious bug, eh? Must be one mother-fucker bad-ass bug, huh, Chan?"
"Worst bug I ever heard of," admitted Chan.
Malkovich nodded. "Well, if the bug is that bad, me and Chan will have to help you get it."
"We don't need your help," said Jones.
"I'll bet you don't," hissed Malkovich.
"You found a nest," said Chan. "Where is it?"
Perez snorted and looked away. Jones shook her head, "Do you think we'd tell you?"
"We're coming with you," said Malkovich.
Perez's face contorted as he wound up to eject some expletive. Jones put out her hand to stop him. "You can't," she said.
"Bullshit," said Malkovich. "You guys can't keep a commission like that to yourselves."
"Doesn't matter," replied Jones. "I was just telling Perez here that these bugs are all of tremendous biological interest. I was going to declare them all lab specimens, but didn't get around to filling out the forms, yet. Perez and I need to find that nest pronto, so you guys are going to have to tag and bag them all for us. Section 3-17, Scientific Priority."
Perez grinned.
"Don't shit us, Jones," growled Malkovich. "These bugs aren't no lab specimens."
"Check out those big octopods," said Jones. "New species."
"So what?" complained Chan. "They look pretty dead. No 3-17 priorities on dead bugs, sorry."
"That's right," said Malkovich.
"The ones in the engine bay, too," said Jones.
Malkovich glanced at the bugs still wriggling in the engine bay. "You can't be serious. That's just a Jumping Mucksucker and a few Portland Gutter Scooters. Stupidest bugs on the face of the Earth."
"That's what you think," said Jones, "For your information, those Scooters were exhibiting signs of an evolved locomotion algorithm that is really amazing. And that mucksucker, I coulda sworn it was talking Morse."
"My ass," said Malkovich. "You pull this, Jones, you'll get no favors from me."
Jones shrugged. "My loss, I guess." She grabbed the cattle prod and nodded to Perez. "Got your ammo?"
Perez smiled, and put his hand out to the other two. Chan reluctantly unhooked a bottle of goo from his belt and handed it over. "And two taser clips," said Perez, wiggling his fingers. "Thanks," he said when Chan coughed up these as well. "And don't wait up for us."
He and Jones turned and trotted down the alley, trying to suppress laughter. "Not bad, Jonesie, you're not bad," smirked Perez. "3-17, that's a good one."
"Fifteen minutes!" called Malkovich from the trucks. "Then we're coming after you!"
Jones waved at them, just before disappearing through the chain link fence. They didn't need permission now that their truck had been disabled. It was justifiable under one or another of the protection of property clauses in the bug laws.
They ran between rows of rusted cars, following the bug trails like frantic bloodhounds. If Malkovich said he was following in fifteen, he could be expected in ten. They would have to be fast to avoid splitting the commission from the nest.
"Check there," said Perez, pointing down a dead-end row of minivans. Jones searched it to no avail, as Perez did the same down another row. Jones came back, dragging the cattle prod across rows of sun-bleached doors and fenders. The noise flushed a six-legged bug out of the weeds, and it tore down the road, making its best getaway from what it assumed were predator bugs.
"Perez!" called Jones, sprinting after it. She stopped at a Thunderbird sans doors, as Perez ran up behind her.
Perez looked under the car. "What is it?"
"I don't know, looked like a Banzai Express, about five kilos." She swung the cattle prod under the car, as Perez kicked the frame noisily. The skittish bug broke out, making another dash for safety. Perez charged after it, banging like crazy on any cars the bug tried to hide in, to keep it moving. Jones stumbled along behind him, watching at each stop to see which way the bug was going to run. Suddenly the bug charged across an open gravel space, and straight down an open storm drain.
Jones and Perez ran up and listened. The scrabbling of the bug's metallic legs as it scampered through the sewer echoed out of the dark hole, audible over their panting. The storm drain grate lay beside the open hole, where it had been pushed aside some time ago.
"Bingo," said Perez. "Who goes in first?" He looked at Jones cheerfully, but she didn't seem keen. "I guess it's me." He removed his pack and pulled out a head lamp, which he strapped over his forehead. "God, I love this part!" He winked and lowered himself into the sewer.
Jones followed, pulling both packs in behind her. The sewer was cramped, and they were forced to crawl. Their pant legs and gloves were quickly soaked by the trickle of water running along beneath them.
Quickly enveloped by darkness, Jones considered stopping to pull her own flashlight out of her pack, but the sewer pipe was too small to turn around and look through the pack or pull it up from behind. She lurched forward and bumped her face on Perez's wet thigh. Her heart jumped.
"What's the matter? Why are you stopped?" she whispered.
"Take it easy," grunted Perez. "I'm just adjusting my headlamp."
"Are you going the right way?" Jones asked.
"Yup," said Perez, too sure of himself. He always took on these underground jobs a little too keenly. Made him think he was some kind of medieval spelunker.
Jones wrinkled her nose at the mosaic of pungent odors, and looked at Perez's butt, filling the sewer pipe just in front of her. "How do you know?"
"Follow the water flow. It'll take you to the main sewer lines. That's where the nest will be."
Jones looked down to see that they were in fact following the trickling water. She shut up and crawled along behind Perez, dragging the packs behind her. She hoped they wouldn't come to a dead end and have to back up all the way to the storm drain. She briefly fantasized crawling backward and having the packs get jammed in the sewer behind them so that both directions got blocked, and they'd have to lie there for days or until swarms of psychotic bugs found them and disassembled them, feet first. She closed her eyes and continued her dogged crawl.
"Ah ha," said Perez, "Here we are." He crawled out into a black space and stood up. They had reached one of the main city sewers, and it was more than big enough to let them stand up fully. Jones rubbed her neck and breathed deep.
"Now which way?"
Perez looked each way, inspected the water they were standing in, and shrugged. "Keep following the water, I guess." They set off, footsteps splashing in the shallows.
Perez stopped, pumping his goo gun and aiming it down the sewer.
"What is it?" asked Jones, drawing the taser gun. She looked around him, and saw the shape of a bug glinting in Perez's headlamp beam. It wasn't moving. "It's dead," she said, moving around him to inspect it. It was stripped of electronics and motors, leaving only a bare metal frame to rust in the city's runoff. Maybe it had run out of fuel and was scavenged. Maybe it was caught by predators. She took a few more steps and spotted a detached leg a few meters farther along, and a plastic armor plate a short distance past that. These were probably dropped by the scavengers/predators as they hauled the booty off to their nest. She waved Perez forward. They were on the right track.
Emboldened, they picked up their pace, trotting down the sewer, now certain that they were close. Perez was eager, rushing forward, panning his headlamp back and forth across the tunnel. Smaller pipes joined the main line at periodic intervals, along with the occasional access shaft, which Perez slowed only briefly to scan, goo gun raised. The splashing of their feet and the echoes of their breathing filled their ears, and too late, they realized they were surrounded by bugs.
"Shit!" bellowed Perez, firing two rounds of goo in random directions. Jones covered her head, and fired at the first moving thing she saw: her own shadow in the light of Perez's whirling headlamp beam. The taser skipped off the wall, discharging against the moist masonry with a blue flash that illuminated bugs everywhere. On the walls, floor, ceiling. Several ran toward them, and slipped by on the walls, scooting back up the sewer from where Jones and Perez had just come. Perez whirled to chase them, goo gun at his shoulder, and ran off with a battle cry.
"Perez! Don't leave me!" shouted Jones, too late. He was gone, and she was left in darkness. She fumbled in her pack for her flashlight, trying to ignore the clicking, clacking noises around her in the gloom, and the echoes of Perez's splashes and cursing filtering down the sewer. She spotted the red glow of a light-emitting diode, and fired at it. There was an electrical crack, a scrambling noise, and the light went out. Two small incandescent light beams appeared, and swept toward her. She fired at one, and the light popped and went out. The other light blinked out before she could get a bead on it.
She took a careful step backward in the dark, and felt her leg brush against something. She screamed, trounced it with the heel of her boot, and whacked it with the cattle prod several times to be sure. They were everywhere.
"Perez! Get back here, you prick!"
Perez's voice came back down the sewer. "You okay?"
"I'm surrounded, I got no light!"
"I got several cornered up here," he called back.
"Jesus, Perez, that's the oldest trick in the book. They lured you away from the nest! Get the hell back here!" She kicked at the water around her feet, and swung the cattle prod around her to fend off imagined attackers. The area seemed to be clear for the moment, so she dug deep into her pack, pulling out pliers, analyzers, bungees, and finally her flashlight. She flipped it on, and pointed it around her, accusingly.
A few adult bugs scampered back when the flashlight beam swept past them, not sure about the predator in their midst. Two twitching bug corpses lay in the water, the victims of her shots in the dark. Junk lay everywhere, struts, brackets, bolts, wheels, all scattered about like bones in a wolf den. Rickety scaffolding had been erected along the walls, to keep the nest above the water that regularly coursed along the floor. Shelves and cubbyholes in the scaffolding contained partial motors and incomplete bugs, missing legs, electronics, or armor. These were the bug young, in mid-assembly, just waiting for the adults to find the appropriate components to complete them and give them their independence. An electric conduit, spaced with light bulbs for maintainance workers, was strung along the ceiling, and the bugs had tapped into this power source at numerous points to feed their hungry families.
Jones looked at one nearby adult, perched on a shelf in front of an incomplete bug with no legs. It was big, like the bug from the dumpster. She pointed her cattle prod at the adult, and took a step forward. The bug raised its forelegs in defense, but took a few steps backward. It was afraid, but it was also willing to die to protect its young. Jones hesitated.
She lifted her taser gun and pointed it at another bug that was dancing nervously on the ground behind her. The bug skittered back underneath a shelf. Intrigued, Jones aimed the gun at another bug, and it, too, tried to hide. These bugs had some amazing pattern recognitition algorithms, to recognize a danger in her mere gestures. They knew she was here to kill, they knew she was capable of it, and they even knew how she was going to go about it.
"Jonesie, what are you doing?" came Perez's voice from behind her.
She looked over her shoulder, to the see the light of his headlamp a short distance up the sewer.
"I don't know," she said. "I've got a very strange feeling about this. They seem to understand why we're here."
"They're machines, Jones. Don't empathize. Just do your job."
Jones shook her head. "No, no, they're intelligent. Look." She re-aimed her gun at another bug, and it tried to duck behind a box. "Lots of bugs hide from predators, but these ones aren't afraid unless I take aim at them. How do they know that's when they're in immediate danger? They're a new species. They've never been exposed to exterminators. They haven't had a chance to develop an evolutionary response to us." She shook her head and looked back at Perez. "They must be figuring it out for themselves."
Perez walked up beside her, his goo gun at his shoulder, and swept the barrel around the nest. Everywhere he aimed, the bugs scrambled and hid. After a few seconds, the bugs began to peek out and creep forward again.
"Huh," grunted Perez skeptically. "I don't know." But he didn't fire.
A short distance down the sewer, a bug crept slowly out from a shelf, and climbed down a truss to the ground. In its forelimbs it carried a small electric motor, from a blender or power drill or something. This item would undoubtedly have formed the core of some bug's locomotion system.
Perez swung the barrel of the goo gun toward the bug, and it dropped the motor and hid under the nearest shelf.
Jones hit him in the arm. "Stop it! Put the gun down." Perez looked at her like she had just popped a brain artery, but he lowered the barrel anyway. After about ten heartbeats, the bug inched its way out, and examined the two exterminators with its monocular eye. Then it slowly went over to the dropped motor, picked it up, and resumed a cautious advance toward them.
Perez shifted his weight. Jones kept her hand on his arm to quell his urge to shoot. The bug slowly moved forward, every movement of its eight legs slow and deliberate, so as not to provoke alarm. Other bugs watched the whole episode from their positions on the shelves, their eyes panning back and forth with barely audible whirrs.
The bug stopped about two meters from Jones. It placed the motor down on top of a metal sheet that protruded from the water covering the floor. Then it scampered back a few steps and hesitated.
"What the fuck?" said Perez.
"Holy shit," whispered Jones. She put her hand to her cheek. She was dizzy. She squeezed her eyes shut and then opened them again. The motor sat in front of her like a small, glistening fruit, with two wires hanging off of it. The bug stood a short distance away, looking at her with that inscrutable eye.
Was she misinterpreting this? Was she somehow blowing this all out of proportion? Or had this bug just tried to bribe her?
"It's an offering," she said.
"Huh?" said Perez.
"It's making a sacrifice in the hope that we'll take it and leave the nest alone."
The implications were phenomenal. Social interaction and communication between bugs was a radical enough concept. But communication between bugs and humans---outright trade that was initiated by a bug!---this was completely unheard of.
"Ha!" said Perez. "It's not enough! We got 'em by the balls. Can you tell 'em that?"
"My god, Perez, you're missing the point. They're trying to talk to us." She looked into the monocular eye of the bug, obviously recycled from a video phone, and saw fear, love for its offspring, and a powerful enough sense of community that it would potentially sacrifice its life in an effort to make peace with the invaders.
She felt a powerful urge to pick up the motor, and walk away. To accept the bugs' offer with grace and without hesitation. It was the only way she knew of saying, "I hear you. We are not that different, you and I. We can come to an understanding."
And then it exploded. Great chunks of its carapace shot into the air, four of its legs were completely severed, and the eye lens shattered. A searing roar whistled down the sewer, the unmistakable howl of a shotgun blast in a tunnel. Jones gagged with horror.
She whirled on Perez, but he was on his knees, with his hand covering his head. Perez never used firearms---she wouldn't work with him if he did. Suddenly two brilliant halogen spotlights fired up just behind them, blinding her completely.
"Get down, Jones," came the voice of Malkovich. "We're gonna clean this place up."
"No, stop, you can't!" Jones had her arms up, but the spotlights were incredibly bright, and she didn't know where to look. "Please, this is very special! Section 3-17, absolute scientific priority!"
"Bullshit," said Chan. "That scam only works once."
Somebody was muscling past her, but she couldn't see who it was. She grabbed at the air. "Stop! Please don't do this!"
"Fuck, let go of me!" said Perez. "I'm not doing anything!"
"Make them stop!" screamed Jones.
A thunderous roar ripped through the sewer once again. She could hear creaking and splintering as scaffolding toppled. The air was full of the sharp scent of gunpowder. Big red spots danced in her vision, everywhere she looked.
"Taser grenades, take cover!" shouted Malkovich. Buf-buf-buf went his grenade launcher, and Jones stumbled toward the wall to get out of the water. The grenades popped and zinged as they sprayed highly charged capacitors into the scaffold wreckage, discharging on bugs, shelving, and sewer water alike.
"Look at 'em all!" called Chan. Another shotgun blast tore through the air. "Run, mother fuckers!"
"Sorry Jones," came the voice of Perez. "Can't let 'em have all the commission." She vaguely saw him get up and charge into the heat of the extermination.
She couldn't breathe. Her chest heaved, and no breath would come. Everything was wildly off-balance. She put her fists to her temples, and sank against the wall, fighting to center herself.
She was six years old, horrified that her uncle was slaughtering a hutchful of rabbits for their meat and fur. She was fourteen, slack-jawed as the family car crawled past the scene of an accident as the police waved them on, their flashlights reflected in blood. She was nineteen, standing in a crowd in an alleyway as two drunken skinheads kicked another man senseless, screaming incoherent strings of profanity.
She was twenty six, curled up in a sewer tunnel, choking on gun smoke and a profound sense of betrayal.
Her ears rang from the furious orgy just a few paces away. With each blast and roar, the commissions ticked over. That's what they do, she thought. I can't stop it, it's just what I do. Jones shook her head and blinked the fogginess from her eyes.
She pushed herself to her feet and followed Perez into the madness of halogen beams and smoke. She had done this many times before. It was just like any other job. She was good at it.
She scrambled over the toppled scaffolding, stabbing through it with the cattle prod whenever she spotted the occasional bug scrabbling for cover. The pickings were pretty easy, since the bugs were big, and many were trapped by the fallen shelves. Four, five, six. She spotted one juvenile trying to make an escape with only three legs. She booted it, snapping one leg, and when it refused to stop, dragging its belly on the ground, she whacked it with the taser gun. About three meters away, Malkovich was clubbing something with the butt of his grenade launcher. Jones stepped over the twisted corpse of an adult that had been hit by a shotgun blast, and glanced at the object of Malkovich's fury. He was trying to bend a panel of metal shelving enough to get underneath, where Jones spotted the glint of several eye-lenses and the nervous flicker of legs. Using the barrel of the grenade launcher as a crowbar, Malkovich pried an opening, thrust the weapon inside and fired. A terrific banging and screeching erupted as the bugs thrashed themselves to death under the weapon's intimate hail of lightning.
Jones staggered forward through the nest, trying to get to the other end, where the bugs would be fleeing. Great pink splotches of goo, like the droppings of a giant bird, covered the wall on her left. Perez was up ahead, shooting gobs of goo down the sewer. She noticed a bug upside down in the wreckage. No marks on it, so she hit it with her cattle prod to be sure. It gave a mighty kick as the prod discharged, and then twitched spasmodically. Clever. It was playing dead.
The shelving wreckage ended as she came up to Perez. "Is that it?"
"Yep. I don't think any got away," he said. A half a dozen bugs were visible farther down the sewer, their limbs gummed together by the goo gun.
The sounds of Malkovich, cursing behind them as he banged on something, echoed down the sewer. Chan joined them. "How many escaped?" he asked. Perez shook his head.
Chan nodded. "Good nest, guys. Maybe twenty-five adults, fifteen juvies. Close to a ton of live product." He grinned. "We all made a lot of money in the last five minutes."
He turned and headed back up the sewer. "Give it a rest, Malkie, you're rich!" he shouted. Malkovich's laugh rolled down the tunnel.
Jones looked at the floor, watching the murky water run over the toes of her boots. Then she looked at Perez, who was watching her silently.
"I think I'll buy me a new TV," said Jones.
Perez patted her on the back. "Of course you will, Jonesie," he said quietly. "Of course you will."