Title: The Beginning of the End?

Author/Pseusonym: Tinnean

Fandom: Them!

Pairing: Bob Graham/Ben Petersen

Rating: NC-17

Status: New/Complete

Archive: yes, just let me know

Series/sequel: sequel to Long Leggity Beasties

Disclaimers: These characters belong to the movie studio that gave birth to them (sorry can't remember which one). They're not mine, but I thought they could use a break after what they've gone through.

Notes: I watched this 1954 movie again after years, and was suddenly struck by the slash potential. This is one of those man screws up the earth type movies.

Summary: With the nest discovered, a way must be found to destroy the threat of the ants. Meanwhile, Bob and Ben's relationship deepens.

Warning: m/m graphic sex, language, spoilers for the movie

"We've only had a close view of what may be the beginning of the end for us!"
--Dr. Harold Medford

A Door Into a New World
Episode 3: The Beginning of the End?
by Tinnean

I was having the most erotic dream! Oh, I had had dreams of this sort before, where I would be helpless and some strong, anonymous male would fuck me until I pleaded for release.

But then, after that drunken incident in D.C., it had become a nightmare. I questioned my responsibility for what had happened, I questioned my manhood, I questioned my worth as a human being.

Now, however, I knew what someone with a knowledge of male anatomy could do, what a cock in my ass could make me feel!

I hummed with pleasure and turned partly onto my stomach, raising a leg and leaving my anus and scrotum exposed. Gentle fingers stroked down my spine, followed the curve of my buttocks and explored the shadowed cleft between.

Mindlessly I pressed back onto the questing finger, slick with lubricant, and accepted it easily. It stretched me and prepared me for the greater invasion. A hand reached around my waist and took my cock into a firm grasp, caressing me, spreading pre come along my hardened length.

Teeth nibbled along my shoulder to my neck and then lips began to suckle. That's going to leave a mark! I thought hazily and then dismissed it as unimportant. The fingers in my ass were removed and I moaned in protest, until something blunt and hot replaced them.

Inch by slow inch it pushed forward until my dream lover was buried balls deep in my ass. Lazily the shaft was withdrawn until only the swollen tip remained, held by the ring of tight muscle. With a powerful thrust forward it stroked across a spot that caused me to cry out in ecstasy. "Again!" I begged. "Please, again!"

The hard cock in my ass fucked me as the hand around my own weeping erection masturbated me.

And my lover proved that his movements were not random, as again and again he found that spot and drove me closer and closer to a climax such as I had never enjoyed, not with a woman, and certainly never with a man.

I was pushed over completely onto my stomach and bruising hands sank into my hips, raising them up off the bed. The speed of his fucking increased and he took my cock in his fist once more. I thrust back onto him, desperate for more, and then suddenly it was all there, just within my grasp. He rocked forward one more time and I began spurting semen through his fingers, onto my chest, onto the sheets and the pillows.

Muted cries spilled from my lover as he poured himself into my scarcely virgin passageway. My eyes flew opened and I realized it was not a dream, it was actually happening, and hard male flesh had impaled me and made me come.

Ben moaned as he collapsed bonelessly over my back. My arms trembled and then gave way beneath our combined weight.

"I thought I was dreaming!" I managed to croak out.

"If you ever have a dream like that, I'd better damn sure be in it!" He carefully disengaged us.

I rolled over and he lay sprawled on me, chest to chest. He wedged my legs apart and settled himself against me, our cocks touching and growing semi-aroused. I wrapped my arms tightly around his waist. His early morning stubble abraded the tender skin of my neck.

"This is going to be very difficult to explain!" I complained mildly. I wasn't really worried, I decided. I carried a gun: I'd just shoot anyone who made a snide remark.

"Nah, it'll be a snap! They'll see that monster hickey I gave you and think you're some kind of stud! Which, may I say, you are! I've *never* had a fuck like that before!"

"It was pretty wonderful for me too," I said, somewhat shyly. "You made it so good for me. You've replaced a really bad memory with one that will give me wet dreams for the rest of my life, Ben. Thank you."

"You're really special, you know that Bobby? And I don't want to be just a memory. I want to be a part of your life!"

I felt uncomfortable. He was the best fuck I ever had, but did I want to take him back to Washington? My job, such as it was, would be at extreme risk, and my family and friends would cut me out of their lives. Could I accept being ostracized by everyone who mattered to me?

Then again, could I deny how he made me feel? *What* he made me feel?

I pushed the thought away. There would be time enough to worry over it once we resolved this crisis in the desert. In the meantime, his lips were wandering over my cheek and jaw, seeking my mouth. My cock stirred to life and his fingers stroked my ass. I palmed the firm cheeks of his butt and pulled him against me.

"Again?" I asked breathily.

"Again!" he agreed.

****

We strolled into town hall where the command post had been set up. Dr. Medford was already there, explaining his findings to General O'Brien, who had arrived sometime before breakfast. He was still munching on a piece of dry toast the old man had absently given him.

"You see, General, we're very close to Los Alamos. When the first atomic bomb was detonated there in 1945, it released a cloud of radiation that must have affected plant and animal life in this region."

"But Dr. Medford, that was almost ten years ago. Would it have taken that long for us to become aware of the results?"

"Yes, indeed, General. This area is so vast, that if it weren't for the people who were reported missing, we might have gone on for more years than I care to think about, ignorant of the danger we, the human race, were in!"

The General flushed an angry red. "If the danger is as imminent as you say, why was nothing done about this sooner?"

"You must understand the nature of the beast, General." Pat Medford joined them and spoke for her father, who hadn't gotten any sleep at all and was running on caffeine and candy bars.

General O'Brien was running short of patience. He had been getting half-assed information for the last week. His commander-in-chief expected him to have everything under control, and he did not want the press involved. The press, meanwhile, was hounding him relentlessly.

Without facing her he barked angrily, "I must understand *nothing*, Miss! You are *not* involved with this investigation, so please keep your interfering nose out of it!" He wheeled around to confront her and snapped his mouth shut as he got the full benefit of her beauty.

"Start kicking yourself, boyo," he thought miserably to himself. "Here's a prime piece of loveliness, and you've thrown a spanner in the works before you could even get to know her!"

"This is Dr. Medford, the younger, General. She actually has a great deal to say about all of this!" I told him easily, enjoying his discomfort. I wouldn't let him denigrate Pat's accomplishments. She had gone far in a field that stubbornly persisted in denying women its ranks. "While her father may be an expert on insects, Pat is the one who specializes in ants. We're going to need her expertise, if we want to survive this catastrophe!"

The General's mouth opened and closed in impotent frustration. I could tell it really annoyed him to be taken to task by a civilian. And then he folded his lips together and took it like a man.

"I beg your pardon, Dr. Medford, " he said, addressing Pat. "I am under great duress, but it was extremely rude of me to refuse to consider your accomplishments. Please forgive me, and tell me why we couldn't have destroyed this nest last night."

O'Brien hadn't reached the rank of general by being a fool. He knew when he had overstepped the bounds, and he knew when to kiss ass. And he had just noticed how very shapely Pat's was.

As I said, the man was not a fool.

"Thank you, General." From the way she lowered her eyes and then looked up at him through her lashes, I was willing to bet that she had realized the same thing.

I wondered if Ben would be pleased to know he no longer had a rival for my affections?

Pat was showing General O'Brien a grid that marked the area where we had spotted the huge anthill. "These ants are night foragers. They stay within their nest during the oppressive heat of the day. If we had tried to destroy it last night, we would have failed miserably, because most of the workers would have been away from it. However, if we go in at, say around noon, the hottest time of the day, we'll be certain of wiping out the entire colony."

"So we go up and drop bombs on it in three hours?" the General wanted to know, glancing impatiently at his watch.

"No, that would be too random. And I must have access to the egg chamber, to be certain that no new queens have hatched out."

"How are you going to do that?" Ben asked. He had been thumbing through black and white photos of ants at war, and he paled a little at the thought of confronting their big brothers in person.

"We'll lay down a suppressing line of phosphorous. The heat it generates will keep them in the nest. They we'll fire canisters of cyanide gas into the opening to kill them. Once the temperature has cooled enough for us to safely approach, we'll go down into it and find and examine the egg chamber."

"Dr. Medford, I don't think it would be a good idea for you to expose yourself to such danger!" General O'Brien protested. "Dr. Medford!" He turned to her father for support.

"I would love to agree with you General, but Pat is the only one of us here who has the knowledge of what to look for."

"She could describe it to Graham!"

"Bob would never be able to tell me what I need to know, and there isn't time enough to give him a course in ant physiology and social structure. *I* go in. There is no other option!"

Ben poked me in the ribs, a smirk on his face. The General looked hopelessly enthralled by her strength of character.

On the other hand, I hadn't been attracted by it at all. I didn't want a strong woman; I wanted a strong man!

"C'mon, we've got to round up those supplies!"

*

To coin a phrase, it was hot as hell out on the desert floor. General O'Brien had been able to mobilize a national guard unit to deal with this. Colonel Kibby had protested that regular soldiers would follow orders better, but Ben had argued that the guardsmen were all locals who were familiar with the area and the territory surrounding the nest.

Colonel Kibby would be loading up my bazooka, while General O'Brien did the same for Ben. It made me a little uncomfortable to see the General so close to my...lover. That was the first time I had ever referred to Ben as that, even to myself. I could feel the heat in my cheeks.

I altered my position slightly so Kibby wouldn't notice the bulge in my trousers.

The Colonel tapped my head, signaling that he was clear, and I fired the first phosphorus round. Ben wasn't far behind, and then the other bazookas were depositing their deadly shells around the opening of the anthill.

One of the ants tried to emerge, and Dr. Medford screamed, "Aim at its antennae! Its senses are in its antennae!"

Our backup guardsmen began firing the machine guns they had been armed with for just such as occasion. The ant dropped back into the hole and we continued firing the phosphorus.

It took about ten minutes before Pat was happy with the results of our barrage. At her signal canisters of cyanide gas were dropped into the opening.

"Is that saturated enough?" General O'Brien asked.

Ben groaned and rolled his shoulders. "If I can raise an arm after we get out of this place, I'll show you just how saturated *I* can get!"

"Lush!" I said softly, but he heard me and flashed me a cocky grin.

Approaching me on the excuse that he needed to give me my equipment, he leaned in close and whispered, "And I love you too!"

I got so hard so fast I nearly doubled over with it. He heard my gasp and moved in closer. "Do you know what you do to me? I want to fuck you so badly, I don't care who's around to watch!"

My face flushed with the images his words drew in my mind and I bit my lip. Ben's eyes were on my mouth, and I remembered his promise the day before to take me down and *take* me. Ripples of desire washed through me. "You're lucky we have a job to do Bobby! Just wait until I get you home!"

I leaned toward him, oblivious to our surroundings.

"Bob! Ben! Are you ready?" Pat had her gas mask on and was waiting for us to set up the stakes and ropes to descend into the nest.

Ben made sure no one was watching us, then pursed his lips and sent me a kiss. Before I could respond to his outrageous gesture, he had turned and was putting on his own protective gear, preparing to go down the hole.

We rappelled down about twenty feet, into an ocean of deadly mist. The area right below the opening was like a muted twilight. Pat switched on her lantern and in the fitful light our shadows grew and shrank upon the walls, giving an eerie otherworldliness to the cavern. Outcroppings appeared to leap out at us, and I could feel clammy sweat pooling under my arms.

Ben took the point, sweeping the area ahead of us before motioning for us to follow. The first corridor angled down and the gas lowered as it cooled, to swirl around our knees.

Suddenly Ben shouted a warning, and I lunged forward, the machine gun I carried at the ready. Not a meter before him was the largest ant I had ever seen. I didn't know then that it was a worker, and at nine feet, one of the smaller members of the nest. My finger tightened on the trigger.

"No!" Pat cried. "It's dead! It would have attacked us long before this otherwise!"

The hairs on the back of my neck were stiff. I was glad something was, because my cock was so limp, I wasn't sure I'd ever be able to use it again for anything except taking a piss! I was positive something was coming up behind me, but when I whirled around there was nothing there.

Pat held the lantern up so the light fell on the sides of the tunnel. She was utterly fascinated by the intricacy of the structure. "Look at this! Isn't this amazing?" Her voice was filled with awe as her hand stroked down the wall. "Held together by saliva!"

Ben swallowed audibly and began walking forward again. "Yeah, well spit's all that's holding me together right now too!"

I would have smiled, but I shared his feeling. All it would take was one more sighting and I was afraid I'd piss my pants.

And then the worst that could happen, happened. A wall caved in on itself and two HUGE ants, their antennae waving, came toward us. The screeching sound we had heard in the helicopters echoed in the cavern, piercing our ears like knives. Those savage mandibles came together like pincers and my mouth flooded with bile.

Fortunately, my finger didn't need direction from my brain, because somewhere along the way my neural pathways were short circuited. Some atavistic instinct went to work, and I was squeezing the trigger and yelling and dodging forward to shove Ben out of the way without any conscious decisions.

Another part of the wall collapsed and when the dust settled, there were ant body parts everywhere. And Ben was down.

I could feel the blood drain down to my gut and I staggered before I could regain my equilibrium. "Ben! Baby!" I tossed aside the machine gun and dropped to my knees beside him. My hands were shaking as I slid an arm under his shoulders. "Come on, Ben! Don't be dead! You can't be dead!"

It was becoming really difficult to breathe and the goggles of the mask were fogging up. And then Ben groaned and pushed weakly at the carcass that had trapped his lower body. Together, we shoved the insect off his legs, grimacing at the sticky ichor that was oozing out of the bullet holes we had drilled through it.

I helped him up to his feet and supported him until he steadied. Unable to contain myself, I grabbed him and held him close to my shaking body. Suddenly my cock was hard and aching and I rubbed it against his hip, needing to have his hands on me more than I needed to breathe.

"Um, excuse me, gentlemen?"

Pat! Oh, Christ, I had forgotten all about her. What could I possibly say that would convince her she hadn't seen what she had seen?

"Adrenaline sure plays hell with a body's emotions, doesn't it?" Ben remarked genially and stepped away from me. "Thanks, big guy. I'm glad you were watching my back."

Pat gave a seemingly unconcerned nod and gestured for us to continue on down through the nest.

"How do you explain those two, Pat? I thought the gas was supposed to kill them." I was coming up the rear again.

"That chamber looked as if it had caved in. The original charges must have caught them in there and sealed them off so the gas couldn't do its job." She drew in a deep breath. "Please God that was the only pair that escaped the cyanide."

I shuddered and seconded her prayer.

We rounded one last bend and found ourselves in an enormous cavern filled with large white capsules. Pat wandered through the field of ant eggs searching for only she knew what.

"Oh shit!"

My jaw dropped open. I had never heard her swear before. "Pat, what is it?"

She pulled out her radio and switched it on. "Dad, are you there?"

"Yes, yes Patricia! What have you found?"

"It doesn't look good, Dad. They seem to hatch out directly as adults, skipping the larval stage. There's an extremely strong brood odor here as well. At least two queens have hatched out! There are no wings."

"Oh, dear God! Are you sure?"

"Have you ever known me to be wrong, Dad?"

"No! Destroy everything in the egg chamber and return to the surface at once!"

"We're on our way, Dad."

She thumbed off the radio and turned to us. "Burn it!" she ordered tersely.

"What?"

"Burn it all!" Her voice was almost shrill.

Ben caught my eye and shrugged. We detached the flame throwers from the webbing that secured them to our backs and sprayed the entire chamber with gouts of flame. The eggs caught fire and exploded, crackling and hissing as the contents cooked into a large ant omelet.

Pat was heading back up to the surface, almost at a run. I motioned Ben to follow her, and I guarded our backs. The odor of burning insect following us up into the sunlight. It clung to our clothes.

Once back up top, we shed the protective gear we wore along with the gas masks. Dr. Medford was almost beside himself.

"Are you *very* sure, Patricia?" he repeated once again.

She sighed and ran her hands through her tousled curls. "Oh, yes Dad."

General O'Brien stood next to Pat, and she leaned against him, letting him support her weight. I don't think even she realized what she had done. "How bad is it?" he asked as he rubbed her back.

Pat was lost deep in thoughts that were not pleasant. Her father answered the General.

"I'm afraid it's as bad as it can get! What we have here are two queens who hatched, dried their wings and took off on their honeymoon flight, followed by two or more of the smaller males. They'll mate. The males are no problem; they will die soon after. But the queens..." He shook his head. His eyes looked old and tired. "A normal queen can lay eggs fertilized on that one
flight for up to fifteen years! These giants...who can tell?"

"Do you know where they'll go?"

"Their wings are generally useless, and the queens will drift on the air currents until they drop off. They'll feel the need to reproduce at that point, and they'll seek a spot suitable to start their colony. And we have *no* idea know where that might be!"

"None at all?" The General looked appalled.

"Not here. Not now. Come along. We had best get back to headquarters. Washington will need to be notified."

"And then...?"

"And then, we find them and kill them!"

END EPISODE 3