My heart sinks when I see what remains of my home. I suppose I had hoped that there would be nothing left; no rubble to sift through, no ruins to search, no reason to think about what had happened. Perhaps I wanted to go away without leaving anything behind.

Of course, I can't do that. My home still stands, great as it ever was and yet still as a stagnant pond. Nobody scurries about the exterior, doing their chores or tending to the children. I hope my family has fled, but even this dim idealism falters as I gaze, melancholy, at the collapsed entrance.

Forcing myself to approach my dead land is difficult and painful. The noxious fumes that I had so narrowly avoided before seemed horrendously strong. Every breath I take stings my innards and makes me wheeze. Still, I continue.

There is something moving in the distance, further even than the massive plant at whose base my home lies. The grim, grey-green brume obscures much of my vision, but I can see something colossal and alien lumbering heavily across the vast plains. What few vague glimpses I can catch of it horrify me. I scurry, terrified, beneath a shrub to conceal myself from this towering, fleshy being.

When I can no longer see the two hideous, giant stalks that are its legs I cautiously emerge. The smog is worse than ever and my insides are burning with agony. My eyes are tingling most unpleasantly, but I cannot blink the vexatious substances away. Still, I continue.

There is a white powder on the ground that sends a torrent of raw, piercing pain through my leg when I tread on it. I find myself writhing in the dirt, my innards stinging from the gas and my legs stinging from the powder. I'm very gradually able to crawl my way out of this particularly thick patch of the dust.

I get up, my entire body aching, and try to walk towards my home. It's very near now, perhaps twenty paces away. Every step lurches me nauseatingly forward. My movements are erratic and consist mainly of involuntary twitches. At this point I have very little control over myself. Still, I continue.

I am now at the base of my home, which can scarcely be seen beneath a generous covering of that terrible pallid dust. After searching for some time I come across a small entrance that managed to avoid the rain of the powder. Hesitantly I enter.

It is very dark now, but there is just enough light for me to see the corpse of my brother, sprawled on his back, his limbs outstretched as though reaching for help that never came. Just beyond his body are several more, identical ones.

I go deeper down the hall simply to confirm my suspicion. As I enter the large central chamber of the home, I see my thousands of siblings lying dead upon the dirt. It seems everybody in the anthill is dead. I swallow my sorrow and my pain and take a harrowing glance back through the tunnel.

Beyond the exit I can see, very faintly, the fleshy, monstrous entity that we have come to know as the exterminator begins to depart with those same heavy steps.