JOHN
The hum didn't stop. It thrummed in my teeth, vibrating my skull like some living drum buried in the walls. I could feel it in my chest, the floor beneath us, the concrete shivering under unseen weight. My palms were slick on the cold steel railing, holding Zak as Chris supported him, steady but tense. Craig had the knife out, Marco's eyes flicked over every shadow, and John--no, I--kept my senses tight, every instinct screaming.
The basement was darker now. Dust swirled in the faint light from cracks overhead, drifting down to coat the long-forgotten shelves. Water puddled in uneven patches, reflecting faintly the movement of the shadows around us. And then I saw them.
The first swarm crawled along the walls like living waves. Wasps. Thousands. Maybe tens of thousands. They clambered over shelves, over corpses strewn across the floor. Some of the bodies... they moved. Walking corpses, human shapes twisted and bloated, their skin stretched over grotesque forms, eggs the size of fists nested beneath it. Others had eggs on top of them, bulging, translucent sacs, some leaking. Their eyes were vacant, and their mouths hung open, buzzing lightly with a sound that wasn't quite words, not quite insect, but somewhere between despair and hunger.
"Holy--" I started, but my voice broke. Even Craig didn't speak. Chris's hand tightened on Zak's shoulder, as if the unconscious boy could anchor us to something real.
The hum rose, sharp and tense. It was joined by a new sound--a high, piercing whine, layered on the vibration already thrumming through our bones. I didn't have to look to know something had arrived.
And then it fell.
A shadow larger than the basement itself struck from above. The ceiling quivered. Concrete cracked with a long, groaning scream. Dust exploded into the air, stinging our eyes. And the spider came.
Not small. Not human-sized. This thing was enormous. Legs thicker than my arms, curving, jagged, tipped with claws that scraped the walls and ceiling. Its eyes glinted, dozens of them, reflecting the dim light as it dropped into the middle of the wasp nest. The wasps hissed, shrieked, the sound merging with the spider's arrival. Wings slapped, bodies collided in a storm of black and gold. The spider reared up, snapping its jaws, swinging legs in wide arcs. Thousands of wasps scattered, their scythe-like clippers clicking, a metallic orchestra of death.
I could see the destruction ripple through the basement. Shelving cracked, old boxes collapsed under the weight of the battle above. Dust, debris, and insects rained down, stinging, pelting, forcing us to duck. The hum became unbearable, a steady roar in my head.
Chris shifted, holding Zak tighter. "We need to--" he began, but words were meaningless here. The basement had turned into a battlefield, walls trembling with every movement, concrete cracking as if the building itself wanted to collapse.
The corpses moved. Eggs inside them pulsed, tiny cracks forming as if the larvae were alive and active, stretching, waiting for something. Some of the walking corpses collided with shelves, staggering, falling into the chaos. I forced my feet forward, kicking debris away, trying to stay upright as Marco ducked under a falling beam, knife ready, eyes scanning.
I caught a glimpse of one wasp--giant even among the swarm--landing on a bloated corpse. Its stinger slid under the skin, egg sacs pressing into the body. The corpse shuddered, convulsed, and staggered forward. My stomach clenched. This was no longer just a fight for survival. This was a horror of breeding, of infestation, of a world that had turned every living human into a potential incubator.
Craig grabbed my shoulder. "Move. Now."
We moved. Low, tight, slipping through gaps between shelves, ignoring the corpses. The spider reared again, legs striking a shelf that sent crates tumbling. Wasps scattered. A human form stumbled forward, carrying an egg sac attached to its chest, limbs jerking unnaturally. The movement was jerky, wrong. My stomach lurched, but there was no time to think about it.
Debris fell. Concrete cracked. A twisted beam crashed between us and the swarm. The spider and the wasps collided, a storm of black, gold, and chitin. Screeches, clicks, and hissing filled the air. We were trapped in the center of it.
I saw the exit. A corner of the basement storage. Doors to the far end. If we could reach it... we might survive. My gaze swept the area: broken crates, jerrycans, a car covered in dust. It was there. Salvation, barely recognizable in this nightmare.
"Get the car," I hissed. "Go. Now."
Marco and Craig took the lead, moving with sharp efficiency. I stayed close to Chris, Zak slumped over, still unconscious, smoke faintly drifting from his arms--a reminder that even the impossible could happen in this world.
The wasps noticed us. Thousands, swarming, buzzing, wings slapping the air like miniature storms. They launched themselves, a wave of predatory intent. I swung the knife, brushing off a wing that clipped my shoulder. The stench of the swarm filled the air--sharp, metallic, acrid. My ears rang with the screeching, but the hum beneath it all persisted, vibrating through my bones.
One swarm crashed against the spider. The two predators collided mid-basement, the spider snapping legs, hissing as its jaws clamped onto a wasp. Another slammed into a human corpse. The nest collapsed in places, eggs spilling out, bodies jerking, moving independently. I stumbled over a body, nearly falling, catching myself just in time.
"Move!" Marco shouted, and we obeyed.The car came into view. Dust-coated, broken headlights, keys in the ignition. Bins of fuel neatly piled in the corner. A chance. A lifeline.
I glanced back. A pillar of shelves was knocked down by the spider, and the wasps flew about in the room like a whirlwind. Others fell on the bodies, others on us, turning its eyes about, chewing, shooting the egg, pushing its bunch against the flesh beneath the garments. The odour of eggs and decay was sickening.
As we approached, Chris crouched with Zak helping him to keep his balance. He had a focused silent face that was pale. Zak presence made a difference in each decision, each step, even unconsciously.
Marco went to the gasport barrels, examining, shaking his head. Halfway, perhaps more than enough to clear of the city.
Craig was now heading to the car. Propping the knife on one hand, I held the other hand free. The buzz was more emphatic now, echoing his way down to the cellar, through the walls, through ourselves.
A shadow passed over the car. Some enormous wasp was making his way out of the nest, big as I never had one before, and his legs were scratching the concrete together. It charged Marco, stinger in blaze. We jumped with a unanimous action of leaping to the car.
His left hand, the hand which was resting upon Marco, was grazed. Pain exploded across his arm. It dropped and he held it, and I knew too late: the wasp had cut right on through the fingers and ripped him open. With a yell he stumbles with spurting blood.
"Get in! NOW!" Craig yelled.
It was clattering as we scrambled, as Chris picked up Zak and put him into the back seat, and Marco stumblingly scrambled beside him. I leaped into the car and searched in the pockets of my keys. The whine, the screaming, the rushing about of legs and wings, the theatre of bodies, the ova, the spider--the whole basement was falling down on itself, as though the law itself had disintegrated.
I started the engine. The car shuddered to life. I heard dust and debris falling on the ceiling, scratching the roof, rattling windows. The spider was cowering above the doorway and its eyes gleamed and its legs were nearly as long as it might have stepped into the car itself.
We backed up slowly. The wasp crawled up, sizzling with wings, gashing legs at the doors. Marco grabbed himself down, with what was left of his hand. Zak was still unconscious, and Chris continued to rest his protective way on the unconscious boy, the smoke still edging away at his arms.
I floored it. There were tires who wailed on fractured pavement. Debris was tracked flying and hitting the car. The impenetrable walls in the basement shook, and we moved into the darkness, pieces of masonry falling, towards the exit.
The spider had leaped and we turned, almost being struck. The dust was in the air, which reduced visibility. The wasp
, Screaming behind us, we did. Quicker, more acute, all the nerves on fire, all the senses conscious.
And then we were out.
Light--dim, poor--came on the road way outside. Dhiona was a lonely street ahead of us, empty and hollow. The constructions were vibrating as though the earth was aching. Bricks fell, shaky walls dropped, avenues disemboweled. And above it, most of all, the moan of wasps, the screaming of spiders, the riot which had eaten Nairobi up.
I glanced back. Behind us the basement was missing. The swarm became weak and fled to nests which had fallen in under the onslaught of the spider. But the danger remained. A single giant spider, one group of wasps, one city completely ruined, and we at the center, pass through the rubble.
Zack was lying insensible in the rear. Blood and smoke and pain and noises--and he was alive. For now.
The road turned into destruction before us. With the other hand I held the wheel and my knuckles got white and my chest began to beat. The vibration continued on the hum, in teeth and floorboard, in the bones of the city as it was.
And then,a shadow.