The shimmering was the wiggle of insect legs and antennae and the snapping of mandibles.

  The red was Lyon’s blood.

  This infestation came with a high cost.

  The shock should have killed her.

  But the expression on her face is one of elation. Even ecstasy.

  She smiled, even as maggots wiggled in her gums and black ants swarmed over her teeth.

  The woman shall now serve Him.

  He has chosen wisely.

  Jake’s stomach rumbled and stretched, distending to the size of a twenty-month pregnancy. His belly button opened like a small mouth, rimmed with thorn-like teeth.

  Without prompt, Lyon pressed her hand into Jake’s stomach, all the way to the wrist.

  The sound of munching and slurping ensued.

  “He has enemies,” Jake told her.

  “I can feel them.”

  “This lake is His outpost. He only controls a portion. After His enemies are absorbed, He’ll finish taking over the lake.”

  Lyon laughed, spitting up nematodes like canned spaghetti. “The lake, the town, the state, the country… the world.”

  “You wish to go to the boys on the boat.”

  Lyon nodded.

  “He will allow it.”

  “I know. I hear Him. I feel Him.”

  Lyon whimpered, then quickly withdrew her hand from the gaping mouth in Jake’s stomach.

  Her fingers had been stripped of flesh, and the bugs swarmed to feast on the remaining scraps still stuck to the bone.

  Yet, somehow, she could still clench her skeletal fist.

  “Go to them,” Jake said. “Bring the boys into His flock.”

  Lyon slipped over the side of the boat and vanished under the water.

  Jake looked to the south, to the opposite shore, toward the home of Sun and Andy Dennison-Jones.

  It’s finally time for vengeance.

  It’s finally time to deal with the enemy.

  SUN

  SAME TIME…

  “How much lidocaine do you have?” Andy asked.

  She had numbed both of them up with dozens of shots and had been extracting wasp eggs from her husband’s face, which was about as sexy as it sounded.

  “I bought in bulk for special occasions like this one.” She raised her voice, yelling through the closed lab door, “Francis! Are the animals all okay?”

  “Yeah, Mom! They’re in my room. We’re watching Little Witch Academia.”

  Andy winced. “Should we let him watch that supernatural stuff?”

  “A demon put a giant wasp hive in our garage so it could grow larvae in our bodies.”

  “Point taken. Is it time to call Frank Belgium?”

  Sun considered her answer carefully. “Frank… hasn’t been himself lately.”

  “That’s putting it lightly.”

  “I think we need to do some more exploration, see if there is anything else around. Every time Bub shows up, he changes his tactics.”

  “He learns from mistakes,” Andy said.

  “Maybe. Or maybe he has a playbook. Sort of a counterpart to Sun Tzu’s Art of War. If one battle-tested plan doesn’t work, he tries another.”

  “And this one is possessing insects?”

  “Possessing. Or mutating their DNA with that reformant serum he secretes. Or building a slave army. Whatever it is he does. He keeps adapting.”

  “But so do we.”

  Sun nodded. “That’s why he hasn’t won.”

  Yet.

  The bulldog began to bark, and the goat began to bleat, and the pig began to oink. A moment later, the doorbell rang.

  We have an electronic alarm system, but sometimes nature’s alarm system worked even better.

  Sun checked her cell phone and opened up the surveillance camera app.

  “It’s Duncan’s girlfriend, Katie,” she told Andy. “And a man.”

  “Mom! Someone’s at the door!”

  “Stay in your room, Francis.” Sun pressed the screen to talk through the door speaker. “Hi, Katie. We’re kind of busy at the moment.”

  “We need to borrow your boat. Duncan’s in trouble.”

  Andy squinted at the screen. “That guy seems sort of familiar. Is he…?”

  Sun reached under the examination table where Andy sat, and used her fingerprints to open the gun safe. They had a biometric weapon stash in every room in the house. She equipped herself with a Sig Sauer MCX-SPEAR-LT loaded with 300 AAC Blackout ammo in an AR-15 mag. Andy took its twin—his and hers assault rifles—and he yelled, “Lockdown, not a drill!” to Francis.

  Francis would bolt his doors and windows and use the trap door dumbwaiter under his bed to get himself and the dog, cat, goat, and pig, into the basement, and the panic room. They’d been drilling him since he could walk. In the beginning, Sun thought it was unfair to the child to put him through that, but being at the mercy of evil seemed not only more traumatic, but potentially deadly.

  Andy took point and Sun followed behind in practiced stack formation, covering over his head while her husband moved in a crouch. They split up when they reached the front door, bracketing the jamb on either side.

  “You okay, Katie?” Sun asked. “Need an angel shot?”

  Katie had shared that code word with Sun and Andy during a get together at the VanCamp’s not too long ago.

  “I’m good, Sun. This is Leo. He’s good. Well, not good. He’s all messed up. But he’s helping me.”

  Sun and Andy exchanged a look, nodded at each other, and then Sun opened the door and Andy filled the doorway, weapon raised and pointed at Leo.

  Leo raised up his hands, but didn’t appear nervous. The last time they’d seen him, he’d been a handsome man who lost a fight.

  Now he looks a lot worse.

  Scarred, bloody, dressed like he came out of a low-budget zombie apocalypse movie.

  And is that a cheese grater hanging from his belt?

  “Leo,” Andy acknowledged him. “Did you come here for us? Or did you know we buy cheese in bulk?”

  “I’m helping Katie. I’m still not sure why I’m here.”

  “Still possessed by Bub?” Andy asked.

  “I don’t think so.” Leo raised a scarred eyebrow. “Are you?”

  “I’m good.”

  “How’s your friend? The biologist? I know he had that out-of-body experience.”

  Leo appeared a tiny bit amused at his own joke.

  “He’s fine,” Andy turned to Katie. “What’s going on with Duncan?”

  “He’s out fishing with his buddies.”

  “In this smog?” Sun asked.

  Katie nodded. “I can’t reach him. Remember I told you about his stalker? She’s back, and I think she took their canoe and is planning on hurting him.”

  Andy said, “Did you try the walkie-talkie?”

  Katie’s eyes got wide. “Shit! The radio! I forgot about the radio!”

  “We can call him on ours,” Sun said. “Andy, take Katie in the basement and try to contact them. Leo and I will got down to the dock and check the lake.”

  Andy stared hard at Leo. “Don’t try anything stupid with my wife, Eddie Van Halen.”

  Katie said, “Eddie Van Halen?”

  “He’s calling me that because I shred,” said Leo.

  Andy winked.

  “What’s with old guys and bad jokes?” Katie said.

  “It’s got something to do with lower testosterone levels as they get older,” Sun told her. Katie came inside and followed Andy to the basement door.

  She considered the battered, broken man standing before her.

  I don’t trust this guy as far as I can bowl him.

  “Are you armed?” Sun asked Leo.

  Leo nodded.

  Sun held out her palm, and Leo slowly handed her a revolver. She tucked it into the waistband.

  “You and your husband are injured.”

  “Bub did his DNA thing with some hornets.”

  “So he’s back,” Leo said.

  “Isn’t that why you’re here? To come and do your master’s bidding?”

  Leo appeared strangely calm. “I don’t think so. I’m don’t feel connected to Bub anymore.”

  “So it’s a coincidence that the last time we saw you, in Oklahoma, you were on Team Bub, and now Bub is here and so are you?”

  “I didn’t know you were here. Or that Bub is here. Or why I’m here.”

  Sun moved her finger off the trigger guard and onto the trigger. “And what if I don’t want to take any chances and end you right now?”

  “You might need more ammo than that.” Leo pointed his chin at her Sig. “And burn me afterward. Burn every bit down to cinder, so I don’t come back.”

  “Damn,” Sun said. “You got dark.”

  He shrugged. “Been a rough few months.”

  “Are you injured?”

  “Not exactly.”

  “Do I want to know about the cheese grater?”

  “Probably not. It didn’t make Katie happy.”

  “Okay. The pier is around the house. I’ll follow you.”

  Sun gave him the move along motion with the rifle, and Leo headed across their property, toward the lake. They had four boats moored to the dock; a pontoon, a speed boat, a paddle boat, and a canoe.

  Leo walked to the end of the pier and pointed. “There’s the pontoon in the pictures Katie showed me.”

  The boat was way on the other side of the lake, in the marsh area, barely a speck.

  How the hell can Leo see that far?

  Sun shouldered the Sig and peered down the WHISKEY5 riflescope, adjusting the optics.

  She saw Duncan, soaked with blood, and someone on shore, equally bloody.

  She also saw something else. In the water, swimming toward them.

  It’s shaped like a human being. But it isn’t swimming like a human being.

  This thing is swimming like an alligator, cruising along the top of the water, with its head poking out of the surface.

  “I think Katie’s stalker just got an upgrade,” Leo said.

  LYON

  SAME TIME…

  The sensation of being a living insect hive was incomprehensible. The feeling existed somewhere beyond pain and pleasure, an intensity so pure it felt as if her nerve cells finally had purpose and meaning.

  I’ve lived my life as an empty shell.

  But now I am full.

  Lyon swam easily, gliding through the water like an anaconda, nearing Duncan’s boat and anticipating their meeting.

  Our first time alone together since he gave me that ride home.

  I’ve spied on him from a distance.

  I’ve followed him around.

  I’ve licked his parked truck. The doorknob to his apartment. The throttle on his outboard motor.

  I’ve followed him around. Online. On foot. In Mother’s car.

  I’ve called him to hear him say hello, only to hang up immediately.

  But now…

  Now I finally get to be with him.

  But Lyon knew it would be more than just being with him.

  More than kissing him.

  More than fucking him.

  More than killing him.

  I’m going to absorb him.

  I’m going to consume him.

  I’m going to merge and meld with him, until our bodies are tangled up in a twist of tissue and veins and muscles and bugs, bugs crawling in and out of us, through us, biting and stinging and feasting and shitting, and together forever entwined we’ll watch the world crumble.

  Ten meters away from her man, Lyon let out a wet laugh, swallowing lake water and a variety of insect life, feeling the jaggy bumps crawling inside her throat and into her stomach.

  I’m coming, my love…

  Soon we’ll be one.

  DUNCAN

  SAME TIME…

  I’m so sorry to do this to you, Chuck…

  As the first few ants bit and stung Duncan’s knees and shins, he hacked and slashed with his Swiss Army knife blade, trying to cut away the plastic carpeting and pull his friend off the floor of the pontoon.

  It meant pulling on Chuck’s shoulder to get room under him, which meant tugging on the hooks lodged in Chuck. The poor guy howled and thrashed in pain, making it even harder for Duncan.

  The carpet was tough, but even tougher was the glue sticking it to the aluminum.

  Come on! Come on!

  “They’re stinging me, Duncan!”

  “Stay still! I can’t cut you loose!”

  “Give me the knife!”

  “Chuck…!”

  “Give me the damn knife!”

  Fearing what his buddy would do, but also unable to continue kneeling in a growing pool of bloodthirsty fire ants, Duncan pressed the Swiss Amry knife into Chuck’s palm and watched, horrified, as Chuck dug the blade into his arm and pried the hook out.

  Once free, Duncan helped him up and they both slapped at their legs as they scurried to the port side. Duncan kicked hard, knocking down the rickety aluminum, seeing Stu only a few feet away, lying on the shore on his back, the rope clenched in his bloody hands as dragonfly nymphs still wiggled into his open wounds.

  He pushed Chuck out of the boat, next to Stu, and then got ready to abandon ship himself—

  —and then stopped.

  The ants are here.

  My friends look almost dead.

  If the ants get on shore, they’ll be eaten alive.

  So Duncan didn’t jump.

  Instead he turned back to face the horde, slowly turning the green carpet reddish black as they swarmed over the boat.

  Duncan ran over them, to the plastic gas tank, quickly twisting off the cap and disconnecting the line and then pouring good old American 93 octane fuel all over his pontoon, soaking the floor and the vinyl seats, emptying out the container and then reaching for his trusty Ace of Spades Zippo in his front pocket.

  “Let’s find out if you’re really fire ants.”

  He flicked the flint and dropped the lighter and then watched for a moment as his beautiful, terrible Facebook Marketplace boat became a beautiful, terrible WHOOSH of barbeque flames, laying siege to the ant army.

  Then Duncan launched off the side of the boat, plopping half onto the shoreline, half in the water, and gave the pontoon float a kick.

  As the fire spread, the old boat slowly drifted out onto the lake, a burning, smoking, floating, sizzling, Viking funeral pyre.

  Duncan looked at his friends. Chuck was brushing away the nymphs on Stu. He still had a lure in his chest, but his arm was free, albeit bleeding badly.

  Stu seems… gone.

  Passed out.

  Or worse.

  Is he even breathing?

  Duncan reached for him, tentative, emotion welling up, then awash with relief as Stu’s eyes peeked opened.

  “Did I hear you actually say…” A chuckle bubbled from Stu’s lips. “Did you actually say let’s find out if you’re really fire ants?”

  Chuck cackled. “Dude. That’s so lame.”

  It was lame.

  But we did it.

  We got to shore. We survived.

  Survived the leeches, the flies, the ants, the dragonflies and nymphs.

  Nature tried her best to kill us, but we got through it, and all that’s left is to heal.

  Duncan’s whole being became lighter, more relaxed, and the joy of being alive prompted an endorphin release that helped to ease his full-body pain and cause him to smile wide.

  “Guys…” he said. “We made it.”

  Through peals of laughter, Stu managed to say, “We made it because you embarrassed those ants with your lame ass one-liner.”

  “Kiss my ass.” Duncan joined in their infectious giggles. “What would you have said?”

  “How about, you’re fired,” Stu said.

  “That doesn’t even make sense,” Duncan said. “I’m not the ant boss. How could I fire them?”

  “That’s a Schwarzenegger joke,” Chuck said.

  “He used it when he fired a missile. This is an actual fire.”

  “It’s worse than Duncan’s,” Chuck insisted.

  “So what’s your tough guy line?” Stu asked.

  “I would have said, here comes a sick burn.”

  “Lame,” Duncan said. “You’re both lame. Mine was best.”

  “Here’s your burn notice,” Chuck tried again.

  “Get ready for a fire sale,” Stu countered.

  Duncan was trying to think of some sort of pun using the word blaze when Katie said, “Duncan! Can you hear me?”

  Oh my God! Katie!

  Duncan slapped at the walkie-talkie still clipped to the waistband of his swimsuit. He yanked it free and pressed the talk button.

  “Katie? Babe? Oh man, I love you so much. Are you on the lake? I thought you were on call. Wait… why are you on the lake?” His joy at hearing her voice became shuttered out by panic. “Katie, don’t go outside! There are bugs everywhere! And we’re not talking mosquitos and deerflies, these things are really dangerous!”

  “Duncan, Lyon is coming for you.”

  Confused, Duncan looked out over the water. “There are no boats on the lake, Katie. If Lyon comes out here, she’ll be eaten alive. We found two dead guys, and we’re all hurt bad. Use the land line and call Sun and Andy next door. They have bee suits. Tell Andy to put one on and get in his speedboat and—”

  “Duncan, it’s Andy. Remember the demon we talked about that one night? It’s controlling the insect population.”

  Duncan considered how ridiculous that sounded, then reconsidered questioning it because of all the hell he and his friends had just endured.

  “Demon bugs?” Stu said. “I’m pretty sure that isn’t a thing.”

  Duncan ignored him. “We’ve been attacked by flies and ants and dragonflies and leeches, and these buggers aren’t playing around. They sting and lay eggs in the wounds. You need to watch out for Sun and Francis.”

  “We’re all safe, Duncan. Where are you right now?”

  “Right next to the fire tower. Just look for my burning boat.”

  “Your boat is on fire?”

  “We’re on shore. We’ve all lost a lot of blood.”

  “We’ll be there in five minutes. Less.”