by Konig, Artor
“Let’s press on.” I said simply. There was nothing else to say; nothing else to do. Even if we did find them alive I could see it would be touch and go us ever getting back to the castle with them, or securing them if we did. It occurred to me to get hold of some reinforcements; to that end I took out my transmitter.
I buzzed the control centre but there was no response. I shook the device, peering at it in the light of the torch. It seemed as if there was nobody at the other end; the signal was strong enough, but my summons evoked no response. I frowned, looking at the Doctor. He made light of my worried look, “They’re probably having lunch; it’s high time, anyway.” I tried to treat my failure to reach the tower in the same vein but I somehow could not do so. Too much that was truly unpleasant had happened this morning for me to dismiss this matter. I swung the beam of my torch once more around the messy room, focussing the beam on the stairs where I felt sure I had seen a flicker of furtive movement.
I watched the stair for a good few minutes but no other signs of movement showed in the white beam. At last I turned away to follow after the Doctor on what I believed to be the final stage of our melancholy journey.
The footprints, yellow with slime, weaved erratically across the floor, the three sets converging on the other passage from different points. Evidently the three men had done as much damage as each was capable of at each time then had beat a hasty retreat from whatever point they were at when they had decided that the opposition had the upper hand. Each man in his turn had stood and fought, wreaking the ultimate damage he could hope to wreak on this fell scourge, knowing that he was alone, that he was maybe facing the end, stung by the creatures and knowing that those stings carried death. Maybe as he stood he had felt the fire of that venom surging through his blood, slowing his senses, destroying his muscles and inevitably closing in on his heart.
Each one had stood his ground for as long as his strength held, as long as his courage answered, bent on destroying those eggs even as he knew he could not destroy their parents. What had finally driven each man to flee I knew not; I never will know; but each man had extracted every last ounce of his life’s worth from those fell eggs before fleeing into the merciless dark.
We entered the passage, feeling a breath of less fetid air coming down towards us. It was from this passage that the smell of blood came. Less the stink of the spiders and their shattered brood; this was a man-smell compounded of sweat, urine and blood. It spoke strongly of men; but it spoke just as strongly of pain and death; the breeze was cold. We went forth in silence, watchful and careful, the light of our torches darting and searching.
The passage was narrow, the roof well above our heads. Here no attempt had been made to level and smooth either walls or floor. Maybe the passage had done perfectly just as it was; maybe this passage was never used; the focus of the stairs being elsewhere in the chamber we had left. But as it had been left it served its purpose well enough. The breeze came in a steady flow. The walls and floor were without holes or fissures; the passage turned to the left and right at intervals; there was never much line-sight before or behind us. At length the tunnel opened out into another, smaller chamber. The roof was high, the floor was level; there were two other passages leading therefrom. But that was not what caught our eyes.
Leaning against the far wall on the floor was Andrew, his face livid, his mouth slack. Saliva was dripping down his jaw; his hands were clenched so tightly that he had crushed the torch in one of his fists. The light was pouring steadily up to the roof. His eyes were bloodshot, the irises brilliant in the light of our torches. We crossed the floor to him at a run, knowing even as we did so that we couldn’t hope to help him. Beside him were two huddled forms, twisted and crushed into that foetal position by wracking spasms that had already done their work. I cast the beam of my torch around the room, looking for any other movement in the room before I knelt down beside the dying man.
“Andrew!”
The sound of his name seemed to stir the last flicker of life; with a wrenching effort he turned his eyes on me and on the Doctor beside me. Recognition came slowly, too slowly for him to do much. Nevertheless with an effort that was terrible to hear, he spoke, “Keep your eyes open; those damn spiders.” He lapsed into silence, satisfied when he saw the gun in the Doctor’s hand, “That’s right, doc; look after the lass. Cassandra, I won’t bug you for tea no more. That’s a promise.” With a terrible final effort he gently squeezed my hand. My eyes could see nothing else, but I saw the light fade out of his. Even beyond that final moment the rigor of his muscles held him upright; there was nothing to say that the soul had left. With grim unease I stood, looking down at the three dead men. The fear was too close; the death was too close as well; I could only feel the threat to my life as I stood there and looked about the hall once more. There was anger up-welling within me; but the fear was louder, stronger; its scent was that of blood.
We examined the other two; there was nothing that could be done for them. There was no trace of the spider in this room though it had passed through. It was Andrew’s foot that had been used to kick the creature; his left boot was smeared with that foul slime. The blood was his as well; there was a pair of ragged holes punctured into his leg just above the top of that boot. The holes were nearly three inches apart. Between them the three men sported seven different bites of two differing sizes; final confirmation that there was at least two spiders.
At length we left them; we still had to find the other spider, however our hopes of saving the boys had been dashed. The Doctor looked around the room, trying to see just where the spiders had got to, but it was extremely difficult to read their trail. The Doctor finally came to the conclusion that only one spider had actually been in this room recently. Which passage it had passed down and why it had left the three men he couldn’t tell.
“We’ll try the near one first then the other one. Come along, Cassandra.” He told me quietly. I shone my torch about the room once again, certain that the other spider was only minutes away. It occurred to me that it may be following us, but I wasn’t sure.
I followed after the Doctor meekly enough but my eyes were on every detail, now they had been cleared by the tragic emotion. I watched before and behind us as we walked down the low, dark passage. The stone of the walls was black; it mopped up the beams of our torches, sending mighty shadows back to torment us. Nevertheless, we pressed on down the tunnel, right to its end.
This passage was obviously untouched. It was plain shortly after we had entered it that we were the first living creatures to have done so for a very long time. But even so we went on; there was no terrible hurry. The spider, injured as it was, would not be going too far. It occurred to me that the one we had killed and the one Andrew had booted may be the same one, meaning that there was one uninjured one at large; but the Doctor dismissed that idea quite logically, “Andrew was busy booting one of them at the top of those stairs round about the time I was shooting the other; that drop of blood you spotted puts a quite definite time on the incident.” He seemed to be more relaxed, more fluid in his panther-like grace now that the worst was known and all that was left was a simple clean-up. He had weighed things up, checked the extra magazines for his pistol; now it was simply the hunt; to corner and destroy the last of this vermin. Now that the odds were down and the shock of the creature’s horrible size and appearance had flowed past, he was functioning efficiently and calmly.
The tunnel ended in a blank, rough wall. The roof and walls to either side were just as nature had left them. The Doctor was swiftly satisfied that nothing led herefrom and that the spider was elsewhere. He turned and led the way back down the passage, back to where the three boys lay in uneasy rest. That chamber, when we returned to it, was almost the same as it had been before but not quite. It was soon evident to us that one spider had passed through. The foul beast had come from the passage we had entered by and had dragged itself across the room to the other passage. This we discovered because of a trail of
grey slime that lay on the floor.
The beast had not even gone near to the three boys; it had simply crossed the floor in a nearly straight line, going down the passage we had yet to check. We had another, final look around to see if there was any evidence of any other spiders. But all the signs pointed to only two; in this lair that is. It occurred to both of us that this may not be the only nest in the caves of this accurst island. At length we turned to the final lap, the last part of this dismal quest.
The Doctor took the magazine out of his pistol and replaced the four cartridges he had already used. I looked at the silvery objects, heavy and squat, the noses of the deadly missiles hollow and scored. They gave me a shuddering thrill; each of those small objects filled with potential death. He slammed the magazine back into the pistol and cocked it. With the heavy weapon held firmly, he led the way into the last passage.
This passage was wider and higher, the walls polished and smooth; at some stage at least this tunnel had been frequently used. But of late it had only been used once; by the spider that was even then making its way down, away from us. Its progress was not slow; that made me worried. The big creature was well out of sight and the passage was fairly straight at that point. There was a breath of sea wind coming up the passage; it seemed likely that the creature would end up in the open. We hastened after it, eager to finish the deed and find some sort of peace for the three boys. In front of us a turn loomed; we were walking swiftly down the passage, the light of our torches bouncing from the polished stone of floor and walls. The line of grey slime down the middle of the floor showed erratic movement on the part of the creature.
With great care we approached the turn in the passage. We stopped to listen; there was nothing to hear, nothing at all. I shone the torch all around me, almost expecting the spider to be lurking on the roof above our heads. The Doctor hugged the outside of the tunnel, his back against the wall, torch and pistol flashing from one target to the next. Once he was fully around the corner, he nodded to me to say the passage was clear. I followed after him. Ahead of us the passage opened out into another chamber, this one larger than the one before. Right at the tenuous edge of his torch’s beam the creature stood weaving on its long and ungainly legs. It had obviously expected us to be ahead of it, and had just turned when it detected the beams of light from behind it.
The Doctor gave me his torch, bracing his weapon in both hands. “Hold the torches wide so it has two targets to observe; keep both beams focussed on it. Whatever happens, keep the light in its eyes.” He told me quietly. He advanced slowly down the passage with me coming up behind him. I peered over his head at the spider, keeping both beams on it. We advanced carefully; the spider stood its ground, obviously uncomfortable in the bright light. With sudden speed it scuttled to one side of the passage, out of the painful beams of light. The Doctor at once saw its gambit; he ran down the passage, calling me to hurry after him.
At the mouth of the passage I focussed the beams on the spider once more; it was a lot closer than I cared to have it. The creature had hefted its heavy body off the ground and was charging towards us. The pistol barked once. The spider jarred, falling back. The Doctor fired again and a third time. The spider tumbled away to lie on its back, shuddering. The long legs waved in the air; some of them. Three of them had been blown away from the creature’s carapace; they lay a few feet away, twitching. The Doctor gave it a final slug, causing the heavy body to blow apart. He put up his weapon, his eyes bright and hard as he stared at the horrible mutant. I felt a wave of blackness coming over me; at once I sank to the ground, waiting for the spell of faintness to pass.
I managed to keep the beam of one torch on the beast. The other one, as soon as my senses had cleared enough, I used to conduct a survey of the chamber we were in. There were no other living creatures anywhere that I could see, but there was one definite trace of life. On the far side of the chamber from the passage by which we had entered, there stood a wide and ornamented wooden door with glass panes set into it.
I laid my head back against the wall, feeling that choking grasp on my throat; I let the tears and reaction overwhelm me, facing one time alone the fact that I would never see those three boys alive again.
14. Great Master
The Doctor left me where I sat, respecting my feelings, while he had a prowl around the room. After a few minutes the horrible movements of the dead creature stopped. That was the last we ever saw of them although they often intruded in my thoughts.
I stood up at length, shining my torch around the chamber. I was feeling flat and dispirited; my mind blank from shock. Still I heard the sharp report of the Doctor’s weapon; still I saw the pathetic, huddled forms of the lost boys. I made the circuit of the room once, coming to a halt beside the Doctor, who was staring thoughtfully at the door.
“Feeling a bit better?” He asked me, keeping his eyes on the ornately carved wood of the double door.
“A bit.” I confirmed listlessly. I joined him in his survey of the solid wooden structure with its ornate leaded panes. That the door was locked was clearly apparent; that we could do little about it without damaging it was not so clear. I had a way with locks, self taught from the days when I had learnt to resent being locked into my bedroom after some minor transgression. I mentioned this to the Doctor to his amusement, but he told me that we would follow the other passage to its end before coming back to the door. I shone my torch on the door one last time before following meekly after him. He went past the dead creature, not too close to it, but not paying it any further attention. I scurried past the still form, keeping my eyes averted. The habit I had recently acquired of looking in all directions at everything, tense for any signs of movement, was still with me; it is a habit that I don’t believe I will ever break.
We went down the last passage, feeling the chill breath of a fresh wind heavy with the smell of the sea. The passage was also well-made, carefully polished and smothered with the pervasive dust. Far down the passage we heard the sound of seabirds. The dust of the floor was disturbed for the first time by our passing; the first time in I know not how many decades.
The passage turned one bend then another, finally opening out on a wide and noisy ledge. The birds greeted us affably, more or less indifferent to our presence. I don’t know what sort of sea birds were there; that’s not my field; but there were plenty of the noisy creatures, flying, waddling, diving down to the sea that was a good way below us. We were facing east; the sun was hidden behind the bulk of the crag above our heads. The ledge went both ways around the face of the cliff; it was wide and safe. Beyond doubt it would have led us to the northern field had we required this of it, but the Doctor was all for getting back to that door, now that we knew where the passage ended and that the problem presented to us by the presence of the mutant spiders had been solved for the moment.
We stood on the ledge, taking a breath of fresh air preparatory for our return underground. I for one was not keen on going back into the caves but I wasn’t keen on letting the Doctor go back there alone. I looked up, seeing a good way above my head the entrance to the Nest. I pointed it out to the Doctor and he had a look, but he was clearly thinking about other things. We stood for a few minutes longer; I could feel that I was on the verge of lunch-time hunger pangs but I didn’t suggest stopping the quest for that. With a certain amount of reluctance I followed the Doctor back into the hadian dark of the cave.
The Doctor wore an atmosphere of distracted thought as if some deep problem was bugging him, as if he was thinking about another set of ideas or struggling with some gloomy thoughts with which he wasn’t too sure how to deal. Maybe it was then that the shock of this dismal morning finally made its first impact on him. He led the way steadily enough, but left his pistol in his belt.
We walked down the passage silently, my eyes were alert for any movement. The air became steadily fouler as we went deeper into that passage, causing me to choke back a feeling of nausea when we came back into the cavern. We wen
t to the door, still firmly locked. The lock was an old, heavy metal job, seeming to have come from medieval days. The metal was black, the wood of the door once polished finely but the polish had cracked and worn in the nearly maritime air of the chamber. The Doctor poked about at the lock, taking out his bunch of keys, the older bunch that he had acquired with the castle. None of them brought him any joy or success. He took out a tiny tool-kit, one of the sort that watchmakers and craftsmen of that kind tend to favour, in its small leather wallet. He normally used it for his electronics; but he had a good idea of how to go about meddling with locks. However this lock was a rather difficult one and after a good few minutes he sat back, his expression annoyed.
I doubt that the Doctor had ever failed to reach his objective before, at least not too often. He sat there, giving the matter a good thinking through. I could see the cogs going round as he pictured in his mind just where each component of the lock must be and what was needed to move them; how they should be moved; basically taking the lock apart in his mind and seeing how it worked. I was on the verge of offering to have a go myself when he reached some obscure conclusion and set to the task once again. I could see at once that he was on the wrong track but I held my peace. After a fruitless ten minutes he sat back on his haunches again.
“Let me have a go, Doctor.” I suggested helpfully. He turned as if he had forgotten that I was there, before he handed the wallet of tools to me without a word.
With torch and screwdriver I examined the lock; doing visually the examination the Doctor had done mentally. The tumblers were not above the keyhole as I had expected them to be; they were on the side. I examined the whole door, seeing then that it was held shut with a vertical set of bars, the other door obviously bolted within. I set to work at once, poking at the tumblers in an inquisitive fashion. Before long I had loosened them from the corrosion that had almost sealed them together. I found a tiny bottle of oil within the pouch, squirting a generous dose onto the rusty tumblers. Then I put my back into the job, working the tumblers free. It was during the course of that operation that I discovered that there was a horizontal bar; below the keyhole that latched the two doors together. It was a matter of focussing enough strength through the screwdriver in my hand to both lift the tumblers off their catch and persuade the bars to move at the same time; it was touch and go, as the screwdriver was not terribly strong. But now I had the nut between my teeth; it was only a matter of time before I cracked it. There was a hideous squeal as the bars drew reluctantly back. The door sagged open slightly, letting out a puff of old air and dust. I sat back, slipping the Doctor’s tools back into the leather wallet. I handed the pouch back to him as he came back to the door from wherever he had been prowling.