by Jonah Buck
Long, multi-jointed legs worked their way down the tree trunk, claws sinking into the wood with each step. Denise caught her first glimpse at the spider’s dribbling mouth, and felt the bolts come a little loose on her sanity.
“Denise, we’ll get you down. Just hang on,” Harrison said as he grabbed his machete.
That was an apt choice of words. What else was she going to do but hang on, a voice in Denise’s head tittered. She mentally grabbed onto her mind with both hands and forced it to focus on solutions rather than simply going blood simple with fear.
Harrison hacked away at the web, but the spider silk was strong. Behind her, Denise could hear the swarm of crabs marching closer with each passing second.
Another swing of the machete, and Denise could suddenly move her left arm. Above her, the tree spider put one leg onto its web and then the other, finding its grip on the thin strands of silk. Tiny black eyes stared down at her, as dark and impenetrable as a miser’s heart.
Harrison worked on some of the other strands, but they stuck to the machete and gummed up the blade. Gail was also working with a large knife of her own. Denise’s left leg came free.
Denise looked up again and immediately flinched back. The spider was only a few feet away, its mouthparts rubbing together in excitement.
She was familiar with how spiders ate. They injected their victims with a venom that liquefied their insides, then they slurped out the resulting slurry of juices. Denise could see a set of mandibles attached to the spider’s mouth, ready to sink into Denise’s body and pump her full of sizzling hot acid.
A remote part of her brain wondered what the sensation of having one’s flesh and muscle slide right off the bone as meaty goop would feel like. Would it course through her body in her bloodstream and send her brain dribbling out of her ears after the first bite? Or was it more localized, and she’d get to watch as her organs melted to chunky-style spider soup right before her eyes? She’d get to find out in a minute. The spider’s fangs were no more than a foot away.
Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiip.
Gail cut through another strand, and the structural integrity of the web around Denise gave way. She fell on her face as the remaining strands tore under her weight. Rolling across the ground, she moved out of the space directly beneath the spider.
She looked behind her. The leading edge of the crab army was no more than ten yards away. Denise snatched up her rifle.
“Thanks,” she managed, but Gail and Harrison were already running again. Denise took off after them.
Behind her, one of the crabs in the front of the group slammed directly into the remains of the web. The silken weave swung and vibrated like a demonic harp.
Alerted to new prey, the huge tree spider moved down the last few feet of its web and snatched up the crab. Its fangs punctured straight through the crab’s shell. The crustacean flailed its legs, but its distant arachnid cousin kept a firm grip with its own graspers. Thick goo started to ooze out from between the cracks in the crab’s carapace, its own melting innards seeping out through its shell. The spider slurped out crab goo with its mouth parts from the hole in the crab’s shell.
However, the spider’s victory didn’t last long. The other crabs that encountered the web snipped at it with their claws. After a few seconds, the already-damaged web collapsed completely, taking the spider and its dinner with it.
The spider landed on the ground in a heap and tried to scramble up the tree. It was already too late, though. More crabs converged on the larger beast. Their claws clamped onto the spider’s legs. Some of them slipped off the thick, smooth surface. Others managed a better grip.
Chitin shattered as the crabs punched through the spider’s armor. They snipped through one leg along the equivalent to the spider’s ankles, tearing a clawed foot off. The spider wobbled but adjusted to its other seven legs as the crabs fought to stuff the foot into their gobbling mouths.
Then the crabs managed to wrench away another foot. And another. The spider collapsed, and crabs immediately swarmed across its flailing body. They tore its legs away from its abdomen. They ripped its chelicerae out of its face and fought over them. The spider was an unrecognizable hulk of pale, blobby flesh a minute later, and it had vanished completely another minute after that.
Most of the crabs didn’t even stop to consider the spider, though. They kept moving up the hill after their human prey.
Denise was almost to the cave entrance now. If they could just make it inside, hopefully they could hold off the onslaught of crabs. Hopefully.
She could see the cavern entrance up ahead, looming wide. It was just one long sprint to get inside and to comparative safety.
Suddenly, she felt the ground rumble beneath her feet. Denise’s first thought was that they were experiencing an earthquake on top of everything else. A tree as tall as a four-story building uprooted from the earth with a mighty tearing noise and fell nearby.
Then Denise saw that the tree hadn’t just uprooted due to the tremor. The tremor wasn’t even an earthquake. It was just another footstep from the thing that uprooted the tree. Denise looked up at over fifty feet of scales and fangs. She hadn’t seen it before only because her brain had processed its legs as just more tree trunks.
She’d forgotten all about the new species of Komodo dragons they met on the island earlier that day.
“We cannot get a break tonight,” Denise said.
EIGHTEEN
HUMANS ARE ALWAYS THE GREATEST PREDATOR
The Komodo dragon stood on its hind legs like a tyrannosaurus, except much larger. Its long body was counterbalanced horizontally by the tail, and a sail stood tall and proud across its back.
It stood hunched, its arms dangling close to the ground underneath the bulk of its body. Each of the claws looked big enough to pick up a car.
High above them, the dragon’s head was the size of a delivery truck. Teeth like traffic cones studded its mouth. The eyes stared down at them from a height normally reserved for large apartment buildings.
A carrion stink wafted off its body in great waves, like the scent of a warzone mass grave. The dragon took another step, and the earth shuddered as if in fear.
“Balls,” Gail said.
“Yup.”
Even the crabs seemed to notice the huge monstrosity in front of them. They slowed their relentless march up the hill and stood, clicking their claws. Their shells caught the light of the moon. Where nothing before had even given them pause, even their primitive little crustacean brains seemed to recognize that the Komodo dragon was bad news.
Denise didn’t even know how it would be possible to kill the dragon if she had to. Maybe a barrage zeppelin. Not even the elephant guns would be able to take that thing on.
“Over here. Hurry!” a voice called. Denise’s head whipped around.
Dr. Marlow stood in the cave entrance. He waved to them, urging them toward the cave. Obviously, he’d found his way here after the group scattered after the moon came out.
The Komodo dragon roared at them, its breath like a blast furnace of heat. It took a step toward them, shoving a tree out of the way as it did so. The top of the tree snapped off halfway up and plunged to the ground. Greenery fell to the earth with a roar of crunching branches vines tearing away like high-tension wires.
Denise didn’t wait. She was already breathing hard after bashing her way straight through the jungle. Denise threw every reserve she had into dashing toward the cave entrance, though. Giant bats weren’t going to stop her. Giant crabs weren’t going to stop here. Giant goddamn spiders weren’t going to stop her. Humongous, gigantic, oversized Komodo freakin’ dragons weren’t going to stop her tonight, either.
The sound of the wind in her ears was swiftly overtaken by the booming sound of footsteps. She could smell the Komodo dragon coming closer. The scent of decaying meat filled her nostrils. It clung to her tongue as she tried to breathe.
Each step the dragon took carried it a dozen yards forward. The creature w
as so massive that each stride carried it across the landscape like the Statue of Liberty out for a stroll.
The cave entrance and Dr. Marlow were close now, so very close.
Twenty yards. The ground shook underneath her feet. Denise could actually hear the earth itself compressing beneath the creature’s feet as it moved.
Ten yards. Now she could see the dragon’s head hovering over her. Rather than trying to bend down and scoop them directly into its mouth, it was going to snatch them up in its oversized claws instead and then lift them up to its fangs, popping them into it mouth like hard candy.
Five yards. Denise could feel a wind at her back, the breeze from something massive approaching. It was from the creature’s scaly hand. It was the wind of the reaper’s scythe.
With a final burst of energy, Denise dove through the cave opening, Gail and Harrison right behind her. She landed in the dense field of guano just as a set of claws scratched at the entrance. The talons scrapped at the rock, digging deep grooves into the stone, but they couldn’t rip the stone away.
Bugs swarmed toward Denise as she lay in the filth. Some of them were as big as her fist. A foot long millipede trundled over to investigate as she drew herself to her feet. She cursed and stomped her feet to frighten the insects away. She finally stepped on a particularly plump weta that refused to be dissuaded, and it popped under her boots. Behind her, Gail and Harrison brushed themselves off while the Komodo dragon raged outside.
Dr. Marlow cringed as the huge creature outside continued to roar and scratch at the cave entrance. “I haven’t seen anyone else since…since that lizard killed Shinzo. I thought I might be the only one still alive. The whole island is filled with things like that.”
“Do you have a rifle?” Denise asked. She noticed Marlow didn’t seem to have one on him.
“No. I left mine behind when I ran, I’m afraid. It’s still in the abandoned shack near where we met earlier tonight. I found a much smaller opening in the rock near the village, and I crawled inside because I didn’t want to stay out in the open.”
Denise took it as a good sign that Marlow had survived in here without major firepower. That meant there couldn’t be too many awful things down here. The bugs were larger than they should have been, and more aggressive at that, but they weren’t as colossal as anything outside. They couldn’t get a full dose of the moonlight down here.
“Do you have any idea what’s making these things transform? You’re a zoologist,” Gail asked.
“I can speculate, but I’ve honestly never seen anything like it. I’ve never even heard of anything like it. I would call it remarkable if it wasn’t so very horrifying.”
“We figure it’s probably the moonlight that does the trick,” Harrison said.
“That’s what I’m assuming as well. I haven’t had anything to do with myself except think and hope nothing found me. Everything only went to pot after the full moon came up. Most likely, the lunar meteorites on Malheur Island have affected the wildlife here in some way.”
“Do you think you know how? I mean, is there any way we can stop it or something? Maybe ward them off? Like wolfsbane or something?” Harrison asked.
“My guess is that the lunar meteorites left some sort of chemical on Malheur Island that worked its way into the ecosystem. Think of it like plants and chlorophyll. When the sun shines on plants, they convert the energy into a form they can use. On this island, if enough moonlight shines on the creatures, it activates the chemical, and they experience exponential growth. It’s built into their very cells, so they’re both very powerful, and they experience unnatural rates of healing. It could be a chemical or maybe even a virus that commandeers the cells when it received the right kind of energy, namely a strong exposure to moonlight.”
“Yeah, but is there anything we can do to stop them? The old proverbial silver bullet?”
“Maybe. I’m sure these things have weaknesses, even if they can take an enormous amount of physical trauma. Conventional poisons would probably work in high enough doses.”
“We definitely don’t have a stockpile of arsenic and chlorine gas sitting around.”
“And while it would be interesting to test and see if the old folktales are true, I didn’t bring along any silver bullets, either.”
“My Nitro Express has done the job on pretty much all the smaller creatures,” Denise said. “I don’t think we can do anything about the behemoth out there, though.”
“Yes, I suspect you would need an armored division to do much about that situation.”
“We should go deeper into the cave.” Denise pointed with her rifle toward the darkness that lay beyond.
“I already came from that direction. It’s not entirely safe,” Dr. Marlow said.
“I was in these caves earlier, and the ceiling here was crammed full of bats. They’re all ahools now, flapping around out there. They might still come back before the moon disappears, though, heading back before dawn. I don’t want to be there when that happens.”
Dr. Marlow turned a shade of pale. “No, I’d rather avoid that myself.”
“And I wouldn’t mind putting some distance between myself and those crabs,” Gail said, kicking away a rat-sized mite that tried to chew through her boot. Even if the full power of the moon couldn’t shine down into the depths, it was still having an effect on the creatures down here. Thankfully, most of them seemed content to go about their business of harvesting guano. Only a few seemed truly interested in attacking the much larger humans.
“I can take us back the way I came,” Dr. Marlow said. “You, Mr. Quint, you should be our rear guard just in case something follow us. We can protect the ladies that way.”
“The ladies can take care of themselves just fine. You’re the one without a rifle.”
Dr. Marlow harrumphed over that, but he didn’t seem in the mind to argue.
Denise suddenly remembered something. The Shield of Mithridates was coming to pick them up. They needed to get back to the coast if they were going to have any chance of reaching that ship.
“Were you able to grab a radio? We need to contact Hobhouse. He’s coming back to the island.”
“No. I didn’t take anything with me when I retreated but here. Hobhouse is coming?”
“Yeah. We managed to get through to him after we sedated an ahool. He’s coming to pick us up. We never got a chance to contact him again before those crabs chased us out of our camp, though.”
“He won’t be able to reach us up here in this cave. We need a way to get back to the coast.” Harrison looked back outside the cavern entrance. They could all still hear the massive Komodo dragon snorting and moving around out there. Nobody was going back that way.
“You said you got into this cavern system from near the village? I wonder if we can meet up with Balthazar and anyone else still alive. We can all get picked up together and surround ourselves with a bit more firepower to boot.”
“I heard some shooting earlier from that direction,” Dr. Marlow said. “I don’t know who else is still alive, if anyone.”
“Balthazar probably tried to get back to his camp on the wrecked German cruiser. Maybe Jubal, Creighton, and Silas made it there with him.”
“Maybe,” Gail said. Even though they were all experienced in the field, this island was still a collection of nightmares. There was no guarantee anyone was still alive. Experience only went so far when it was tossed against the unknown. Still, Dr. Marlow had survived, even without a weapon. He was practically defenseless, and he was still alive. Perhaps there was hope after all.
“Maybe some of them managed to regroup at the village,” Harrison said.
“The locals didn’t exactly seem friendly before,” Dr. Marlow said.
Denise finally understood the warning the man in dungarees had given them when they landed. He’d told them they had until the next night to leave the island. It wasn’t a threat; it was an attempt to ward them away from Malheur Island before this happened. The full moon w
as a regular event here. They knew what was going to happen. That’s why they had a wall in place.
She also understood the part her translation skills had garbled now. At first, she thought the man was saying something about the mountain or a mound. Maybe even mouths. Now she knew the word that hadn’t quite registered. He was trying to warn them about the moon. The words were similar enough that she couldn’t tell the difference when they were spoken aloud.
“It’s possible the village took in some of our friends tonight. We’ll check it out if we can. It ought to be another safe place if they’ll let us in, too. We can wait for the Shield of Mithridates there if we have to.”
“Think you can lead us that way, Doc?” Gail asked.
Marlow looked back. “We just follow this stream most of the way. I think I can get us through the last bits of the caves. It’s not far from where we split off. Then we just follow some old lava tubes. Simple enough. There’s a couple of places where light comes down from the ceiling, though. I never saw anything, but I heard things a couple of times.” He fiddled with the pistol on his hip apparently without realizing he was doing it.
“I think we’ll manage,” Denise said, hefting her Nitro Express. She felt more confident about moving through the caves this time than her last visit. They had guns. They had ammo. They had lights. She even had a coil of rope this time that she’d taken from their base. So long as the tunnels weren’t infested with creatures, and they shouldn’t be with the moon blocked out, they were fully prepared.
Moving out, Dr. Marlow pointed the way ahead. Their flashlights played over the damp stone walls. Moss, insects, and slime covered almost every surface.
They walked beside the little underground creek as the water gurgled and worked its way down into the earth. More water dripped from the ceiling and stalactites and spattered against the earthen floor. Some of the cold cave water dripped on the back of Denise’s neck, and she nearly jumped.
Something small and pale splashed in the water as they walked past. Everyone swung their flashlights around to see what had made the noise, but it was already gone.