A Tyrannosaurus stationed at the head of the dinosaur phalanx broke the silence. It was Major General Ixta, and his voice was like a sudden clap of thunder on the horizon. ‘Little bugs, only ten minutes remain until the empire’s deadline expires. If you return to the Ivory Citadel right now, destroy all your churches, and then come back to Boulder City and resume work, I can grant you more time. Otherwise, the imperial army will begin its assault.’

He raised his right forelimb and gestured nonchalantly at his troops. ‘Take a look at the 2,000 soldiers before you. They represent less than one-thousandth of the imperial army’s total strength, but they are more than capable of flattening the capital of the Formican Empire. The cities our children build in their sandpits are bigger than your Ivory Citadel. In fact, those kids could flood your entire city just by pissing on it! Ha ha ha!’

A deathly hush settled over the battlefield. The Cretaceous sun quietly rose higher, and ten minutes soon passed.

‘Attack!’ boomed General Ixta.

The phalanx began to advance. The ground trembled under the rhythmic tread of 2,000 dinosaurs, creating waves in the puddles left by the rain. The ants did not budge.

‘Queen Lassini and Field Marshal Donlira,’ General Ixta roared in the direction of the massed columns of ants, ‘I have no idea whereabouts you are, but if you don’t order these critters to make way, our feet will crush them to a pulp! Ha ha ha!’

As he stared at the ant army, he noticed a distinct ripple running through their ranks. He peered more closely and saw that the ant infantry had erected countless tiny structures. To him they looked like blades of grass newly sprouted from the blackened earth. A niggle of doubt lodged in his massive dinosaur brain, but the niggle was not sufficient to give him pause, and so the dinosaur phalanx pressed on.

A second surprising change now swept through the ant army. The smooth black pool that had blanketed the ground suddenly went lumpy and separated into a multitude of miniature spheres. Ixta was reminded of the wondrous movements of the ant word corps, and for a moment he thought the 10 million ants in front of him were about to spell out something. But the ant clumps did not reshape.

The dinosaur phalanx continued its advance until it was just ten metres from the ants’ frontline. Only then did General Ixta realise that those blades of grass were in fact a barrage of miniature catapults, cords stretched taut, each pocket loaded with a cluster of ants!