“Well, obviously somebody imported them … illegally, I suspect. Or, I guess, accidentally. Macrotermes are builders—architectural masters.” Humphries put a stopper on the flask and set it back down on the table. “The African sun is a brutal force, which the bellicosus termite has managed to tame. Their mounds are the largest non-man-made structures in the world. They build thermoregulated chambers inside them that maintain a temperature of precisely eighty-eight to eighty-nine degrees, with ventilation ducts that continuously refresh their air supply. The temperature is critical because their primary food source, a fungus, won’t grow in any other temperature. I spent six months in Africa studying these critters. Marvels, really. Absolute marvels.”

“Ever see them eat a lion?” Lou asked. “Because the swarm I witnessed could probably do just that.”

“No,” Humphries said dismissively. “Their primary food source is that fungus, or else they chew up wood and digest whatever nutrients they can.”

“So how do you explain what you just saw?”

“That’s just it!” Humphries exclaimed with youthful exuberance. “I can’t!”

Lou and Darlene exchanged excited looks.

“So what’s next?” Lou asked.

“I’m going to dissect Her Majesty, if you don’t mind. I need to look at the queen.”

Within minutes, Humphries had the queen termite under a microscope. His fingers moved with remarkable delicacy and economy of motion. On occasion, he would pause to wipe sweat from his brow, a move that made the tattooed insects on his arm appear to come alive.

Lou and Darlene huddled close by and watched in silence.

“This is odd,” Humphries said, mostly to himself.

“What? What’s odd?” Lou asked.

He and Darlene had moved in closer. Their arms were touching, but neither attempted to pull away.

Humphries looked up from his microscope, his expression bewildered.

“This queen is about twice as large as the average M. bellicosus queen. This one here is more than ten centimeters. Her egg-laying capacity seems to have been doubled as well. Maybe tripled.”

“What does that mean?” Darlene asked.

“It means that if these insects exist in the natural world, they would probably have more egg-laying capacity than any creature on the planet. The fecundity of these termites suggests they could cause a very serious environmental imbalance.”

“So, do you think it’s a mutation?” Lou asked.

“No … I don’t,” Humphries stated. “If this were a naturally occurring mutation, at some point I, or one of my colleagues, would have seen these insects in the wild. Their breeding would be massive and impossible to contain. We’re talking a major shift to Mother Nature’s already tenuous balance. I think these insects were engineered in a controlled environment.”

“Engineered? How?” Darlene asked.

“My guess is radiation,” Humphries said. “I’d have to run some tests on the samples you brought, but my bet is I’ll find high levels of ionizing radiation that produced an abundance of free radicals within the termite’s cell structures.”