The First Bird: Omnibus Edition

by Greig Beck

  Even though the light was dimming, they could pick out the numerous mounds. Luckily for them, it seemed the massive arachnids were territorial, and demanded a certain amount of space between their burrows. Megan was confident they could navigate without coming too close to any one of them – besides, they had no choice.

  The women edged along slowly, and Megan saw that the armadillo creatures were now down to just over half of their number – poor things, she thought. They had been bunching tighter and tighter. Suddenly, as if some point of final compression had been reached, they exploded outward, compact bodies and short legs racing toward the jungle edge.

  Good for them, Megan thought as she alternated between watching the beasts and keeping her distance from the mounds. The fleeing animals, still keeping their young in the center of their herd, lifted her spirits and convinced her that she and Carla should do the same – sprint, rather than creep along. They needed to get out of there – the thought of being trapped in the open when the giant monstrosity that had attacked Jian was still behind them, was a nightmare.

  “We should also—” The words had barely left her mouth when some of the closest spiders launched from their burrows. Three of the many-legged horrors, each the size of a large dog, moved at a frightening speed toward their prey. Long, muscular bodies easily overtook the smaller animals and huddled over the screaming beasts, burying finger-length fangs into their armored hides and then dragging the jerking animals back to their lairs.

  “Oh no, no, no – they’re coming out.”

  *****

  The women ran. Megan felt like she was flying as she belted across the open ground, fear giving her wings. Carla managed to stay with her for the first few hundred feet, but then started to fall behind.

  Megan veered slightly, angling to avoid one of the mounds. They weren’t that far from the jungle edge now. As she looked over her shoulder she was horrified to see two of the trapdoors behind them fly open and a pair of massive black shapes burst from their burrows. The things were a chaotic blur of long legs and bristling determination. She felt like crying as she tried to accelerate.

  “Keep going!” Carla screamed. Megan could see she looked about to stop. No way – fucked if anyone else is going to sacrifice themselves for me today, she thought, and dropped back slightly to allow Carla to catch her.

  Megan grabbed Carla’s arm. “Follow me and do as I do.”

  The closest spider was now only about fifty feet away. Its black glossy eyes were like small pools of obsidian atop a muscular, humped thorax. Another fifty feet back came the next one.

  Megan swerved, dragging Carla toward one of the remaining trapdoors. When the sound of the creature’s scrabbling feet was loud in their ears, they ran across the silken mesh of tripwires. The reaction was immediate. As the lid flipped back, she and Carla swerved sharply, and the spider behind them leapt. It was intercepted in mid-air by the approaching monster – she was right, the things were territorial, and the encroaching spider had issued a challenge that could not be ignored.

  While the two giant arachnids wrestled on the ground, the last spider closed on them. Megan ripped at her shirt, bursting buttons and tearing it from her back. In one swinging movement she turned and flung the damp material behind her. The garment opened in the air like a parachute, and by instinct the spider leapt on the moving object, burying its long fangs into the sodden material.

  They sprinted the last few hundred feet and dove into the undergrowth. Megan immediately rolled to her feet and snatched up a broken length of tree branch, turning and pointing it sword-like in front of her.

  She waited – seconds passed, but there was nothing. No sound of pursuit, no multiple-legged monster bursting through the hole they had cleaved as they dove through the wall of jungle – nothing but silence.

  “Did … it … give up?” Carla was dragging in ragged breaths, unable to raise her head from the ground.

  Megan peered through the hole.

  There came a maelstrom of sound and, as she watched, the spider raced back toward its burrow; it dove in and dragged the manhole cover shut, disappearing like a magician’s trick. It had looked … panicked.

  Her breath caught in her throat – she could now see the reason for the noise and frantic activity. The massive monster, the devourer of Jian, had entered the clearing.

  *****

  Megan scrambled down the embankment of a stinking river that bubbled up out of the ground. Carla arrived next to her in a roll, covered in mud and debris. She stayed on her knees, sucking in huge breaths and spitting out mud-speckled sputum. She coughed, then vomited onto the soil, forcing up nothing but stringy bile, streaked with mud.

  Megan shook her head. “It’s a freakin’ swamp.” She turned back, and then stood up, peering one way, then the next. “I don’t know – should we go around?”

  Carla just lay on the ground, groaning. “I guess so …” She closed her eyes.

  Megan squinted out over the pools of shallow, boggy water, broken by huge trees standing on stilt-like roots. The water was a brackish red, and a silver mist hung over everything. She rubbed her forehead with her arm, and immediately felt more perspiration rush to take its place. It ran into her eyes, bringing with it some of the debris she had picked up on her mad dash through the jungle.

  She looked over her shoulder and held her breath for a second or two, concentrating on the sounds behind them. It was difficult to make anything out – everything that could chirrup, croak, or scuttle seemed to congregate near the stagnant pools.

  Megan turned to look out over the heavily misted water. “So, swamp or no swamp?” As she scanned the wet landscape, a large bird glided toward her, coming in fast. It didn’t stop, and zoomed to within a foot of her face.

  Megan raised hands to protect her eyes, but the thing hovered in front of her like a toy on a string. The massive insect had two golf ball-sized compound eyes at the front of a two-foot-long body, and long, diaphanous wings, beating so fast they were nearly invisible.

  Carla sat up and threw a handful of mud at the enormous dragonfly. It changed direction, heading back out over the water. She snorted. “I think no swamp – bad things live in swamps. Besides, if that creature manages to find us, its longer legs will probably navigate the mud better than ours. Let’s try and stick to the drier edge.”

  Once again, they started to jog. They ducked under hanging vines and trees like fleshy weeping willows, their draping limbs covered in a sticky leaf that had trapped small animals and insects as they passed through the curtains of green. The ground underfoot was beginning to flatten and become spongy as the dry bank disappeared. To their dismay, it seemed the entire landscape was turning into a bog.

  To Megan’s left, the water was now complete – a massive lake with any opposing bank hidden behind a thick mist. It reminded her of the old Hammer horror movies that had Nessie rise up to roar at some poor Scottish soul who had wondered too near to the Loch after dark.

  They plowed on, the soft ground taking its toll on their legs. “We need to rest.” Megan stopped and bent over, hands on knees and taking in deep drafts of the stinking humid air. Carla seemed to have found a second wind. She had her hands on her hips and had wandered a few paces forward to survey the landscape. Megan was amazed at her stamina – she was used to jogging five miles a day before breakfast and doing aerobics three times a week. After the rush across the spider field, she had expected to be carrying the CDC woman by now.

  Carla turned and shook her head. “I agree we need to rest, but not here, not now.” She turned again, peering into the jungle, clearly expecting an unwelcome appearance at any moment.

  “We need to find some high, and preferably dry, ground.” She swallowed audibly. “And some water.” She looked up overhead. The light was fading to a dull maroon – there was little of the day left. “We can’t be caught on the ground – maybe we can find one of the banyan trunks we can climb.”

  Megan groaned, dreading the thought of spending t
he night in the jungle. She slapped at her bare shoulder – things the size of sparrows whirred and buzzed close by, trying to alight on her sweaty skin. “Okay, a bit more then. But we should also think about looping back soon.”

  Carla nodded. “Sure. C’mon.” She turned and started off again.

  Megan followed about five paces behind. She stepped in an ankle-deep puddle, causing a small wave to slosh up over its edge. Something splashed in the lake, and the mist momentarily swirled. “Easy Nessie,” she whispered nervously.

  The pair slowed now – they had no choice; the boggy ground sucked at their boots and splashed them with slimy water. Every inch was a battle. The smell was becoming sulfurous, and most footsteps elicited a fart of swamp gas trapped just below the surface.

  They searched for high ground, or at least a tree trunk so they could get above the stinking morass. Megan plodded on, head down, mostly watching her feet and swerving around the trees that stood on slimy stilts above the boggy mess.

  Ahead of her Carla had stopped. “Oh no.”

  Megan swiveled and then sagged with disappointment. “End of the line – we’re fucked.” Their muddy trek had ended on a peninsula of brown swampy soil. Excepting their route of entry, there was water on all sides – not just the shallow brackish pools they had been meandering through, but deep water, stained red by the flowers, just like the pond they had entered the crater through. Away in the mist, things splashed out from the bank, and looking down into the shallows, Megan could see small creatures wriggling and jerking in the warm water.

  Carla spun, looking around them. She shook her head. “Two options – we try and cross, or we double back, pronto.”

  “Huh – you mean swim it?” Megan pushed her wet hair back off her face. She looked out over the water, the mist hanging over a surface that seemed alive with movement. Time and again, the water surface swirled and lumped, as if there was a large fish just below the surface. She laughed softly, the notes sounding slightly manic even to her own ears. She shook her head.

  “You know, the next time I demand to come on one of your trips, can you be a little more forceful when saying no?”

  *****

  Max Steinberg grabbed a tree trunk and turned to lean against it. He pulled an expensive-looking silver compass from his pocket and flipped the lid, turning it one way and then the next.

  “Fucking stupid magnetic hell-hole fucker.”

  He snapped it closed and jammed it back in his pocket. He had the feeling he had somehow wandered off the trail he had been following, although “trail” was a flattering description. It was really just a slightly less tangled area of the jungle, with flattened grasses. He was moving so slowly he wasn’t sure he’d be able to catch up to the rest of the team now.

  He looked at his watch – ten to five – no wonder it seemed a little dimmer, even with the heavy canopy overhead. He’d give it another ten minutes or so and then turn around. It’d take him roughly an hour to get back, with just enough light left to try and swim through the tunnel. Fuck the bird if it drowned. Now that he knew where this place was, he’d come back with a big enough team to net, shoot, or eat every motherfucking thing in this hidden shithole.

  He smacked his lips. Suddenly the thought of diving into the dark water and finishing his evening with a hot meal of monkey pie or whatever concoction the little Brazilian whipped up sounded pretty good. He was sure he’d be able to convince Moema to head back – after all, money always talked loudest in these stinking places.

  He continued on, no longer in a hurry, taking another bite from his remaining piece of dried meat and washing it down with water the temperature of hot blood. Looking around, he grunted – it all looked strange, and yet familiar at the same time. He paused at a jumble of fallen logs, trying to remember whether or not he had been past here before.

  A rustle in the brush beside him convinced him to keep moving. He looked at his watch again – still two minutes to go. Bugger it, he’d gone far enough. He turned on his heel and started to walk quickly back the way he’d come.

  He was feeling more unsettled with every step. A thousand eyes watching every second, Moema had said. Sure feels like it, he thought, feeling the hairs on his neck prickle. He stopped and whipped his head around, listening for a few seconds.

  “Who’s there? I’ve got a gun.” He wished he really did as he started walking again, picking up his pace. It was like the time he decided to walk home from a bar to sober up. He’d turned into an alley and within two seconds knew he was being followed. This felt the same, but a million times worse.

  The rustling in the heavy undergrowth was only a few feet in, but whoever or whatever it was remained hidden … and worse, it seemed to be keeping pace with him.

  “Fuck off … I’m a good shot.” Max pulled his hunting knife, the ornate silver pommel engraved with the letters “M.S.”, and brandished it as he walked. He hoped the silver tooth would be enough to deter whatever giant rat or bug had decided to follow him. In his other hand he held a forgotten morsel of dried meat. He tossed it toward the sound.

  “That’s all you’re getting.” He started to jog, muscling his way through strangling vines and fern fronds. The rustling sounds kept pace.

  Max sped up a little more, but the undergrowth beside him was pummeled and pushed as the thing worked hard to match his speed. From the sound and force, he estimated it to be the mass of a good-sized dog – maybe a hundred pounds – more than big enough to give him some trouble.

  “Shit, shit, shit.” He picked up a stick and threw it at his invisible stalker. It hissed – that was it.

  “Fuck it.” He ran.

  Max Steinberg bullocked his way forward, slashing his hunting blade at anything in his path. He knew he was panicking, but he couldn’t help it. Fuck Kurt for leaving him. He’d fire that bastard when he next saw him.

  He paused for a second. Everything looked different. Either the path had shrunk, or he was wildly off course. He charged on. There was an open patch of grass ahead, bordered by a leaning tree that made a perfect hurdle. He ran and leapt, his short legs never gaining enough height to clear it. His back foot snagged and he came down hard.

  His pursuer finally burst from the foliage behind him, keen to take advantage of his misfortune. It landed on his legs, pinning them, and Max looked over his shoulder, his mouth dropping open in a scream that his stricken throat refused to release.

  “Gah …” His mind refused to assemble the image, to make words, or to categorize what he was seeing. It looked like a giant monstrous glove had gripped both his legs. Glossy black exoskeletal fingers were wrapped around his lower body, bony knuckles flexing, and on the back of the glove … eyes.

  Fucking goddamn giant spider! his mind finally screamed. The massive Mesothelae was more than five times the size of the one he had shot at on their first trek. Up close, the detail was like something from a mad, drunken nightmare. Its body was long and powerful, a glossy licorice black, and on top of a long, lumpen head, glass-like eyes regarded him with cold, alien indifference. Still face down, he tried to move, but the spider’s grip was like steel cable.

  The movie producer was hypnotized as he and the spider stared at each other, evaluating, understanding their respective positions – one predator, the other prey. Max tried to turn over and simultaneously slash backward with the blade of his knife. The monstrous creature scrabbled forward and then two fangs as long as pencils penetrated the tough fabric of his pants to slide into the soft flesh of his buttocks. The pain was excruciating, but only for a second or two, then it was quickly replaced with a flooding warmth as the poison started to take effect.

  “Fuck no-ooo.” The last word stretched, coming out squashy as the muscles in his tongue started to relax. His head and shoulders dropped to the ground. He could see, smell, and hear everything – it was just his muscles that were now held hostage by the venom of the massive spider.

  Max could see the ground move under his face, and knew that the arachnid w
as tugging him into the forest. “Kurt!” he yelled, but only in his mind.

  He remembered what Joop had said when they were watching the smaller spider attack the tiny horse – it would liquefy its prey and then drink the fluids straight from the body. I’m about to become a Max Steinberg milkshake, he thought morbidly.

  He thought he was thrashing, screaming, punching, and kicking, but the frantic activity only took place in his imagination now, as he was dragged back into the thick foliage.

  A shadow fell across his vision – a person, was it a woman? Hard to tell. Tiny, naked, and covered in hair, she watched him with indifference for a second or two. Save me, his eyes pleaded.

  She darted over, but only to pick up his fallen knife. She turned it over in her little hands, then looked back into his frozen face. She held up one palm, the fingers curling up and down. He would have laughed if he could – she was waving goodbye.

  *****

  “Looks like someone just drove a truck through there.” The men stood at the edge of the clearing, looking out over the churned ground. The creature they had been following had broken cover to cross the clearing. Its massive bodyweight and clawed feet had scraped a path across the landscape.

  Kurt stepped out, and squatted. The edges of the furrows were still crumbling inward.

  “It’s not that far in front now.”

  “Well, what are we waiting for?” Matt stepped out onto the grass beside him.

  Kurt rested his elbows on his thighs, looking up at Matt. “Do you think we should consider what we’re going to do when we catch up to it? We’ve got a few sharp sticks, a few knives, and one gun – not much against a freakin’ biological tank.”

  “Yeah, we don’t try and kill it – we just change its mind … or direction.”

  “Piece of cake.” Kurt grinned and got to his feet. He started to walk and Matt went to follow.

  “Wait, wait, something is not right.” Joop reached out and put his hand on Matt’s shoulder. Matt shrugged it free and spun at him.