The Halperins, Ross, and Greta, bought their new home in Phoenix, Ariz., right at the bottom of the market. They paid an unbelievably low price for a modest two-story house that exactly suited their needs. Since their purchase two weeks ago, their house had increased $100,000 in value based on comparables.
The house had easy access to grocery stores, gas stations, emergency health clinics and pharmacies that they would frequent for their daily needs. The Halperins had no children, but the house was large enough for a sizeable family, and nearby schools were some of the best in Phoenix.
The front yard was tastefully done in crushed rock, with a sculpted fig tree that required very little water even at the height of summer. The backyard was well landscaped with a green sward and mesquite and citrus trees, but it required a lot of watering and gardening that the Halperins felt were well worth the money.
Featured at the center of the backyard, was the Halperins’ dream swimming pool, surrounded by dense foliage and fed with water constantly through a stepped waterfall into the back side of the pool. Their backyard attracted birds of all kinds and some insects.
In their side yard, was an ornamental orange tree that always held fifty to one hundred apparently ripe oranges hanging from its boughs. In short, the house and grounds were a kind of desert garden paradise, a classical hortus conclusus, in all seasons—or so their realtor had assured them they would be.
In March, the Halperins had moved all their belongings from icy, snowy New England, and they had arranged everything to suit their new style of living in a land of nearly perpetual Arizona sunshine. Every day, they sunned themselves cautiously, and then in the late afternoon and sometimes in the evening, they dipped in their pool.
In early April, they noticed a visitor to the pool, a large golden wasp, which they tried to lift from the water with their long-handled pool net. The wasp was not, as they had thought, dead. It was not only alive but wary. As the net approached, the wasp rose from the surface of the water, hovered for a moment to get its bearings, and then flew away.
The Halperins mused that the wasp had been using the surface tension of the water to support itself and that the wasp was apparently cooling itself and then possibly taking some of the moisture back to its nest just as mud daubers out East did from standing pools of muddy water.
The next afternoon, the wasp—or a wasp very much like the first one the Halperins had seen—came to dip in the pool. It did not seem to mind that the Halperins were swimming there. It assiduously avoided the area of the waterfall and the shaded area under where the squat, tri-partite palm tree bent down over the water lending shade.
The wasp clearly liked to take the water in the sunshine. It avoided shade. The wasp would bathe for perhaps three minutes, then rise from the surface, hover and fly away. It seemed to want to avoid the Halperins and any objects that happened to be floating in the pool. Even when the wasp was wafted by a gentle breeze across the pool, it seemed to enjoy the surfing effect, up to the point where it entered the shaded area under the side of the pool. Then the wasp would take off, hover and fly away.
Until the middle of April, one wasp was the daily limit. The Halperins reasoned the wasp had needs for which it had adapted, and the Halperins’ pool was perhaps the nearest such pool to the wasp’s nest, wherever that was. Since no activity by the humans seemed to perturb the wasp and since the wasp did not in any way threaten the humans, the Halperins stuck to their policy of “live and let live.” Why not?
The one day that Mr. Halperin had experimented with the net to see whether he could drown a wasp by taking it underwater with the pool net, he discovered that holding the wasp underwater for three minutes had no effect on the wasp. After the wasp had been brought to the surface after submersion, it revived immediately, hovered and flew away. The wasp had not attempted to swim while underwater, and it had not been stimulated by the threat of drowning to attack Mr. Halperin, or even countenance his presence.
At the end of April, Mrs. Halperin detected that there was a second wasp. She had noticed a very large wasp was floating on the surface at the usual time in the afternoon, and as it rose from the surface to hover, a second wasp had hovered and landed on the water.
A day or two later, she noticed the pattern changed slightly so two wasps swam at about the same or nearly the same time. The wasps kept a half-length of the pool between them, and they did not seem to communicate with each other in any discernible way while they were on the water.
A few days later, Mrs. Halperin was a little unsettled when she realized the two floating wasps were relieved on station by two additional wasps, who took the places of the first pair of floaters after they had flown away.
Ross’s research on the Internet did little to discover the species or habits of the visiting wasps, but the Halperins began to scan the surrounding houses from their elevated porch on the second level of their house in an attempt to spot from which adjacent yard the wasps originated. This attempt proved unsuccessful, but the Halperins thought that a house over their back cinder-block wall might be the source.
They decided to walk around to the front of the neighboring house to see what they could. The house was under renovation. On the sidewalk in front of the empty house, they found a swarm of black honeybees had nested in the city water feeder unit set in the ground by the walk in front of the property.
The Halperins decided to call the city about those bees because the city’s meter readers would be mightily surprised to find the bees, possibly at the risk of having the bee swarm sting them badly. Even if the bees were dangerous Africanized bees, they were not wasps, so the Halperins were still perplexed about the source for the wasps that visited their pool each afternoon.
On the next day after they found the black honeybees, a very small version of a golden wasp floated on the surface of their pool at the usual time. The small golden wasp seemed to have no trouble discovering how to land, maneuver, hover and fly off after its bath. Mrs. Halperin marveled at the power of nature to force adaptation across generations of creatures, enabling each successive generation to accomplish what its predecessors had done without explicit training or apparent example.
Now, six wasps took turns in the pool, only two floating at any time, and one wasp gently landed on Mrs. Halperin’s arm while she rested in the water by the sunny side of the pool. Mrs. Halperin did not panic, and the wasp arose from her arm and flew away. She was becoming increasingly alarmed, not because one wasp had landed on her arm, but because of the increasing number of wasps.
It was Mr. Halperin who first noticed that one of the wasps flew off, not over their back wall as the rest had done, but right into the palm tree at the back of the pool—the palm with the overhanging fronds and the thick, oozing fruit tucked under its boughs.
Now, the Halperins thought their exterminator might help, so they called IOS Exterminators. Ramon Gonzales, their IOS field representative, drove right out to investigate, but he found nothing in the palm to indicate the presence of wasp nests. He opined that the wasps were probably not from the Halperins’ yard.
Ramon was the exterminator who, on an earlier call, had swept away the messy black cobwebs that Mrs. Halperin thought had been caused by black widow spiders. He had said, at the time, that the webs were definitely not characteristic of black widows.
Now, on the subject of wasps, he assured his clients that they need not worry. Ramon thought that wasps were normal, like the large black beetles, big as hummingbirds, that flew around the palm in the early evening.
“Those beetles do bite, so be careful,” he warned, and then he departed.
Ramon did not mention at the time that the Halperins’ call had been the fifth wasp-related call he had answered that very day. He had learned when he returned to the office that calls from all over Phoenix were pouring into IOS with complaints about golden wasps.
No one knew the source of the wasps, but they all knew golden wasps were common in the Phoenix area. This year’s crop of wasps seemed larger than normal. That was all. No one had reported being stung, but it was getting hot now in unprecedented ways.
Ramon recalled that wasps generally did not like excessive heat. In the heat, wasps became almost crazy and stung anything around them out of frustration and rage at what they could not control.
Two weeks later, Arizona began to experience what were called three-digit days, when the temperature every day rose above one hundred degrees Fahrenheit in the late afternoon and stayed at that level until darkness, before lowering to the mid-to-high seventies in the early morning hours.
Some people swam in the late afternoon after work on those days, but most swam well after dark when their yard lights went on low, and their pools were like exotic aquariums under the starry desert sky. Skinny dipping was said to be popular among young and old alike. Wasps did not come after dusk, so no one gave their swimming habits any thought.
The temperatures rose in late May to 108 degrees Fahrenheit, and Phoenicians shod their dogs’ paws in special Velcro-attaching doggie shoes to protect them from the heat of the pavement during their walks. By June, it was clear that temperatures would break all prior records, regularly rising above 110 degrees.
The population kept within their air conditioned houses or made haste between one air conditioned building and another all day long. Siesta time was not spent poolside, and pool activity was limited to the night.
The Halperins, being retired, did continue to use their pool during the daytime, and they noticed that the wasps began their floating in the early morning in increasing numbers, and they continued until the hour before sunset. Now not in ones or twos, the wasps came in dozens, and they covered the surface of the pool like a skein of miniature golden oblong globes. They came and went with such insistent regularity that they were a marvel to behold.
The first incidence of a wasp sting occurred in the middle of June when the temperature had hit 118 degrees Fahrenheit. A wasp had reportedly stung a small child. The wasps seemed to be everywhere in Phoenix now, and IOS was becoming frantic with the level of their activity. They had avoided public panic by waiting for a truly alarming development.
Ramon knew that a wasp stinging a small child was probably not going to be the catalyst for newspaper coverage. What would stimulate the press to begin their feeding frenzy would be a swarm of wasps stinging someone nearly to death. Unavoidable coverage of that event would lead to public outcry, and that, inexorably, would catalyze actions by the mayor and the governor.
Ramon’s guess was close, but only IOS management knew the true scope of the matter, and they had already stimulated a press campaign alleging that Global Warming was to blame for unprecedented temperatures and for infestations well beyond anyone’s ability to predict the consequences. Likewise, the medical community put out radio warnings for citizens to stay inside, to avoid swimming during daylight hours, and to call exterminators immediately upon finding infestations, particularly of golden wasps.
In fact, quiet phone calls had been made by the mayor to the governor and from the governor to the head of FEMA. Teams were frantically gaming alternatives against loss of vital communications, electricity, and water as an emergency grew into a catastrophe.
Evacuation routes were reviewed. Police and National Guard leadership personnel were informed. Readiness was priority one, but still no hint or warning went to the public. In fact, the authorities put out classified notices to all their people that they should not inform the citizens of what was happening since the public would panic and worsen the situation. Public servants and national guard persons made preparations for evacuating their own families. Their children disappeared from schools.
The prime catalyst came on an extremely hot day when the Halperins were taking their afternoon dip in their pool. Ross and Greta had become so accustomed to their visitors that they had no sense of panic when literally hundreds of wasps sat on the surface of their pool while others hovered over the whole yard and took turns relieving the floaters.
Greta, now totally unafraid of the wasps, felt them land on her hair and even on her eyelashes, then rise and drop to the water’s surface. Ross marveled when he scooped a handful of pool water and twenty wasps landed in his hand and along his hairy arm.
The couple shared a proprietary look as if to say, “Look at our golden wasps! Who would believe this?” They would descend under the surface, and the wasps would rise and hover, waiting for them to resurface. Some of the wasps would ride on the human bodies when they descended, and then fly off when the human bodies broke the surface again.
It was on such a day that Ramon called on his daily rounds, sweating from the sweltering heat and impatient to be done with his monthly sprayings and inspections. Entering their backyard, he saw the Halperins in the pool and the clouds of wasps hovering over them, and he thought he was witnessing the apocalyptic moment just before the world would end. Quietly he raised the pressure on his sprayer and was about to begin hosing the air with his deadly spray.
At that moment, Mrs. Halperin called out, “Cheerio!” She told Ramon, “Go right on to your next appointment.”
Mr. Halperin said, “Ramon did not know what he was seeing. He shouldn’t spray the wasps because they’re really friendly.”
Ramon was on the verge of panic now. Had the Halperins been so badly stung that they no longer had reason?
Seeing Ramon’s hesitation, Mr. Halperin told him, “Just go back outside the gate, lock it, and go away. Everything will be all right.”
Ramon knew an order when he heard it. He stood down on the sprayer, backed through the gate, locked it and returned to his white IOS truck. He was about to climb inside the truck when a swarm of wasps flew over the gate as if in pursuit of him. He must have thought that because he instinctively turned on his sprayer and raised it.
He then let loose the spray with its full effect, spraying all around himself and the truck, and then dived inside the truck. But his efforts were both futile and much too late. The wasps enveloped him and the truck, excited by the heat and the threat of the spray. They covered and stung Ramon with total fury.
Strangely, Ramon felt no pain. He felt the presence of wasps on his eyelids and his neck, indeed on his entire body. Perhaps, he thought, he was feeling the effects of adrenaline. Then, he sat up and got out of the truck, marveling at the swarms of wasps that surrounded him and flew in all directions as far and as high as he looked.
Slowly the golden wasps dispersed. All of them disappeared. Ramon was left feeling euphoric. He knew he should probably race for the emergency medical facility, but he reasoned that he was probably too late for that. He called IOS headquarters to give a status.
He could not get through because of communication problems. He figured that the state of emergency had begun. Communication was going to be impossible as long as the emergency lasted. Steeling himself, he decided to be a good citizen. He would not flee. Rather, he would try to help as he could. So he went back through the Halperins’ gate fully expecting the couple to be dead.
He was very surprised to find the Halperins exactly as he had left them. They were surrounded by wasps, but entirely at ease. They were playing together and with the wasps. Ramon shook his head.
Mr. Halperin waved to Ramon and said, “As you see, everything is just fine. Why have you returned?”
To this Ramon threw up his hands, turned and walked away. Sitting in his truck for a long while to digest what had occurred, Ramon finally put the key in the ignition, started the engine and drove to his next appointment. He turned on his radio and found the emergency frequency, but nothing was on the station but static. As he hit one of the major grid roads, he noticed that swarms of wasps were visible in every direction.
By everything Ramon had ever known, he was facing an enigma. Clearly, the wasps had proliferated beyond all prior experience. They were swarming all over Phoenix. The heat was such that their excitement should be pressuring them to sting everything and everyone in their sight. Yet that was not happening.
The Halperins and he himself were proof that the wasps were not dangerous. If the wasps had been dangerous, the couple and he would surely have been stung to death.
Ramon drove not to his next appointment, but instead to the IOS headquarters. There, police and emergency vehicles were rushing in and out. Inside the office was pandemonium. He rushed up to the dispatcher to report what he found at the Halperins’, but he was told to write up his report right away and submit it to his supervisor. Then, he was ordered to stand by for dispatching.
People were calling from all over the city about gigantic swarms of wasps. An evacuation was on the brink of execution. The National Guard had been called up. The governor and the President of the U.S. had declared Phoenix a disaster area. Troops and money were on the way. Command centers were being set up across the city and the state. All the news networks were feasting on the story.
On the way to his office to write his report, he met a reporter who had sneaked into the facility. The reporter was Ramon’s friend. He looked shocked, then very relieved. He said that he thought Ramon was dead, stung by a swarm of wasps while servicing a client. Ramon’s body had been positively identified. What a miracle it seemed that he was here alive!
The newspaper man veered off suddenly saying that he had a lot of news to get on the wire, including the news that Ramon was alive after all. Ramon shook his head in disbelief.
Then, he had one of those sudden epiphanies. He pinched himself or thought he did so. He yelled out loud his own name—Ramon Gonzalez! No one seemed to hear him. He went back to the dispatch desk, and this time, no one was present. He went outside and there were no automobiles, police cars or emergency vehicles.
He looked up into the sky and saw that the wasps had totally eclipsed the sky from horizon to horizon, and the cloud of wasps was thickening, subsuming everything, including the trees, the cactuses, the street signs and the streets. The wasps seemed to him to be enveloping his own body, swarming over every one of his limbs and his face, head, back, and shoulders.
In early September, the remains of Ramon Gonzales’s body were found in the driveway of Ross and Greta Halperins’ home. According to IOS records, he had been dispatched to investigate the presence of golden wasps in the backyard of that home at the time just before the general emergency had been sounded.
His sprayer was found beside his body, and it was empty. An autopsy showed that he had probably not died immediately from wasp stings. His was a slow and agonizing death, the coroner thought, but he told Ramon’s mother that the death had been instantaneous.
In any case, the cause of Ramon’s death was ruled as cardiac arrest resulting from massive numbers of simultaneous stings. Five hundred thousand people of Phoenix had suffered the same fate within the same two weeks. In a panic, the remainder of the population had fled the area by any means available. It was said to be the largest unplanned evacuation of citizens America had ever witnessed.
Of course, like many others, Ramon did not know that he was dying of wasp stings. In his final hallucinations, he thought he was still alive when he went back to his office.
Chain failures left a land devastated because it was stripped of every vestige of civilization. When the power failed, all air conditioning in greater Phoenix failed, and the water and sewer systems failed, too. Communications failed early and stayed down the entire time. The much-touted FirstNet had become mired in politics and funding crises, so it had never fully come online.
The golden wasps literally took over the greater Phoenix area. When they had completely engulfed the area, from mountain to mountain and desert edge to desert edge, the peak daytime temperatures ranged for twelve consecutive days over 124 degrees Fahrenheit. One day the temperature spiked to 140 degrees.
At this point, which in hindsight was the apex of the emergency, all the golden wasps were in the desperate grip of madness. On that day, at precisely four o’clock in the afternoon, the temperature spiked, and then the wasps, as if they were one single organism, suddenly collapsed from the many days’ accumulation of heat. They died in flight and fell to the ground all over Phoenix, like volcanic ash five to seven inches deep everywhere.
Some wasps were believed to have escaped by flying to the North, but scientists had no proof of that, only theories with which they garnered grant money. The scientists did opine that not one wasp in Phoenix proper could have survived the infernal heat.
Local authorities, relieved that the panic phase of the emergency might be over, began to comb the Phoenix area, building by building, and yard by yard. It took them two months to execute the beginning phase of the clean up. Wasp bodies were harvested, compacted and stored in a mound for possible use as a fuel. Human bodies were buried in mass graves or burned in huge funeral piles. Disease was a major fear, but no plague occurred. This was nothing short of miraculous.
The stench of death and decay set in and hovered over Phoenix like an evil spirit for over a year. The religious among the people of the city thought of the incident as similar to the biblical plagues, only worse. Some fanatics proclaimed that the End of the World was near. Flagellants whipped themselves through the streets. Jeremiads were uttered on several major street corners. Hair shirts were sold and worn with muted pride.
It would be nice to think that all these events never occurred. The authorities certainly tried to make events seem like distant memories of the global pandemics of yore, or like more recent tsunamis that struck in distant oceans and killed many hundreds of thousands. All people like to put the worst behind them. After they suffer through a genuine disaster, they like to get back to normal as quickly as possible. They revert to the mean as best they can.
Therefore, it should not be surprising that, after a very expensive reconstruction with many hundreds of thousands of properties sold as fix-up investments, in the same neighborhood, in the same house as was formerly occupied by the Halperins, a sign went up in early March of the year selling “the next best thing to paradise” with a swimming pool and beautiful landscaping at a relative song of a price.
The realtor introduced the property to a newly retired couple, who loved it at first sight. The couple wasted no time before moving in. As soon as they could, they plunged right in the pool. Finding a small golden wasp on the surface of the water did not bother them in the least. After all, everyone said that the disaster was over, and everything was back to normal in paradise. The sunshine and all that blue sky, all those brilliant green palms proved that they were safe and secure here in Phoenix, Arizona.