The First Night
By the time the sun sank low, Amir and Sari were too exhausted to keep walking. They had trudged through thick vines, crossed two streams, and hacked through undergrowth with sticks that felt more like toys than weapons. The weight of what they had seen in the second village clung to them like smoke.
When the sky began to bruise purple and the cicadas grew louder, Amir knew they had to stop. The jungle at night was alive with predators, but he feared the wasps more than anything else.
They found a small clearing near a waterfall, where the spray misted the air and coated the rocks with a cool dampness. The water’s roar drowned out the jungle sounds, which gave Amir some comfort.
“We stay close to the water,” he said, scanning the area. “If they come, we can hide in the spray. Their wings cannot handle this much moisture.”
Sari dropped heavily onto a rock, hugging her knees. “And if they come in numbers?”
Amir did not answer.
He gathered damp branches and built a fire, using his last pack of matches. The flames caught reluctantly, sending up thin smoke that curled into the canopy. He hoped the fire would mask their scent.
As the night deepened, the jungle shifted. Crickets replaced cicadas, owls hooted in the distance, and something large crashed through the trees far away. But through it all, the constant roar of the waterfall gave them cover.
Sari stared into the flames, her eyes reflecting the flicker. “Do you think anyone else survived?”
Amir poked the fire with a stick. “I do not know. The second village… it looked like they tried to fight. But those patterns…” He shook his head. “It felt like something more.”
Sari’s voice trembled. “Like they were mocking us.”
Amir looked at her. “Or learning from us.”
The words hung between them, heavy and terrifying.
Hours passed. The fire burned low. They tried to rest, but every snap of a twig jolted them awake. The waterfall’s mist dampened their hair and clothes until their skin felt clammy.
Then Amir heard it.
A faint hum, threading its way through the roar of the water. Low, constant, too steady to be anything natural. His eyes snapped open.
He reached out and touched Sari’s arm. She stirred, blinking. “What?”
“Listen.”
She sat up, her body going rigid. The hum grew louder, weaving in from the treetops. It was not the furious swarm they had heard in the village. This was smaller, exploratory, like a scout.
Amir rose slowly, gripping a rock from the riverbed. His pulse thundered. He motioned for Sari to stay close to the spray of the waterfall.
The hum came closer.
Then he saw it.
A single wasp, hovering at the edge of the clearing. Its body gleamed in the firelight, golden-black and monstrous. It circled the flames cautiously, antennae twitching. Its wings glistened with drops of water, but it seemed unbothered.
Sari’s breath hitched. “It found us.”
Amir tightened his grip on the rock. “Only one. If we kill it fast, maybe…”
The wasp darted toward the fire. Amir swung. The rock connected with a wet crunch, knocking the insect to the ground. Its wings spasmed, buzzing frantically against the dirt. Amir raised the rock again and smashed it down until the buzzing stopped.
The clearing went still.
Sari exhaled shakily. “Do you think… it called the others?”
Amir scanned the trees. “Not yet.”
But even as he said it, his stomach twisted with doubt.
They dragged the wasp’s carcass into the waterfall’s current and watched it vanish downstream. The fire sputtered low, and they dared not rebuild it, afraid the smoke would draw more.
Instead, they pressed themselves into a shallow hollow in the rocks, water dripping over them, and waited.
Sleep was impossible. Every time Sari’s eyes closed, she saw the spirals of bones in the hut. Every time Amir blinked, he imagined the sound of wings multiplying in the canopy.
Just before dawn, when the sky began to pale with the first hint of light, they heard it again.
This time it was not one.
It was many.
The hum swelled through the trees, louder and heavier, a living vibration that rattled the leaves. Amir and Sari crouched lower in the hollow, their bodies pressed together, cold and shaking.
The swarm was searching.
Dozens of shadows flickered above the canopy, weaving between branches. The sound pulsed, shifting from one side of the clearing to the other. Then silence.
They held their breath.
A single wasp dipped lower, passing just above the waterfall. Its antennae twitched furiously, sensing something. For a moment Amir thought it would dive into the spray and find them.
But it rose again, wings slicing through the mist, and re-joined the others.
The swarm drifted away. The hum faded with the dawn.
Sari’s legs gave out, and she sank onto the wet stone. “We cannot survive another night like this.”
Amir stared at the pale morning sky, every nerve still on edge. “Then tomorrow we find a way out. Or we die trying.”
