The hills are alive with glowing hornets

AIKEN, N.C. — Federal officials say a radioactive wasp nest was found from the Savanna River Site—a former Cold War nuclear bomb component plant—earlier this month.

The nest’s removal has left many locals thankful that the threat of radioactive wasps was about as short lived as the murder hornets from a few years ago, but for one local man, the removal of the glowing insects is nothing short of a personal tragedy.

“I’ve been feeding them wasps nuculer waste for about a decade now,” said Aiken Clay, a generational farmer whose property borders the facility. “When they opened this site up for nuculer waste dumpin’ and whatnot, my gran‑pappy weren’t about to get kicked out based on government lies about the long-term dangers of exposure to radiation.”

Clay says he had been hoping the radioactive proximity would grant him superpowers. Instead, he developed acute radiation syndrome and “a weird lump” on his neck.

“So I seent me an opportunity a few years back,” he explained. “I started drip‑dropping some green goo on this bee’s nest—I didn’t know they were wasps, but out here you work with what you got.”

Clay’s plan was simple: raise a hive of super‑sized stinging insects, let them inject their nuclear venom into his bloodstream, and emerge as a winged vigilante.

“I’d be flying all about stinging bastards that come up on my land,” he said. “The police took my guns after I had a nervous breakdown in the Winn‑Dixie back in ’04, so I need some way to protect my civil liberty.”

Local physician Dr. Tad Crater was less than impressed.

“He did what?!” Crater said, visibly recoiling. “Jesus Christ … How would that give you powers? I’ve been treating that asshole and his asshole kids for radiation symptoms for years.”

Crater likened the potential genetic fallout to the 1977 horror film The Hills Have Eyes.

“They’re already halfway there,” he said. “That one little punk, Devlin, he’s got six fingers total between his two hands. He started with eight, but his little brother Darvin bit two off—one during a Fourth of July party, the other just because he felt like it.”

The Department of Energy says the radioactive nest was destroyed and bagged as radiological waste, with “no impact to workers, the environment, or the public.”

Clay remains undeterred.

“I’ve still got plenty of bottled nucular waste,” he said. “This is just a little bump in the road on my way to becoming a horrific human‑wasp hybrid monster.”