“That’s right, how would it have managed it. You’re being silly Laurence,” he said out loud.
He yanked the doors open, gritting his teeth against any possible conflict and found that there was no spider there. The bat was resting on the top shelf exactly where he had left it. He had put it in the cupboard so that any potential sunlight wouldn’t warp the damn thing and make it useless. He picked the bat up and immediately began to feel better. The weight of the bat filled him with the confidence he needed to fight off any other invasion. He closed one of the wardrobe doors and was about to close the other one when a huge set of spiders legs appeared over the top of one of Lorna’s boxes at the bottom of the wardrobe. Laurence let out a reflexive bellow and jumped backwards. The backs of his legs caught the folded up skeleton of Lorna’s old exercise bike. He had bought her that damn bike for her birthday and she had used it only twice that he knew of. Not long after, she had come up with the idea of going to the gym, plus the optional extra of sleeping with her personal trainer. In Laurence’s mind, that bike had tripped him up once already and here it was doing it all over again. He crashed to the floor on his back, knocking the wind out of himself. The first thing that came to his mind was that the bat was no longer in his hand, he had dropped it somewhere whilst he was falling on his arse. His eyes went to the wardrobe. There was a spider the size of a good sized dog trying to scramble its way on top of the box and out of the wardrobe. It began to click at him, which sent the spiders on the window into a frenzy again. Snatches of light danced around the room as the sunlight was allowed to break through the collection of legs and ugly bodies on the glass outside. Laurence staggered to his feet, aware of a dull pain in his ankle which made him wince and grit his teeth. He saw the bat on the floor to the left of him and he scooped it up, his confidence returning with the weight of the bat in his hand again. The spider was shuffling its way to the front edge of the box and it was tickling the floor with its front legs, trying to find a good way to get out of the wardrobe. Eventually it just fell out, curling its front legs under its body. For a moment it was unable to move and then it managed to right itself. One of its front legs was still caught underneath it, and that was all the opportunity that Laurence needed. He stepped forwards and raised the bat over his head. Just before he brought the bat down he saw that the legs of the spider bore a strong resemblance to the spider he had encountered in there the last time he had gone digging for junk. Then he brought the bat down hard on the spiders’ head. There was a sound, like eggs being smashed onto a tiled floor. The spiders’ head caved in and pus began to ooze out of the new hole in its head. Its legs and body began to convulse and Laurence could hear a swooshing noise as the spiders flailing legs whipped through the air. He pulled his bat out of the spiders’ head. It made a nauseating tearing, sucking noise as it came free. Laurence didn’t stick around to see any more, he bolted for the door and slammed it shut behind him. He began to descend the stairs, breathing hard. He thought that a little nip of his emergency whiskey was in order to calm his frayed nerves. He knew that last nights’ bottle was still in there and there was at least one more bottle tucked away right at the back (his emergency, emergency supply as he liked to call it.) He was halfway down the stairs, his mouth salivating at the prospect of a drink, when he heard the letter box beginning to tap, as if someone was at the door. He stopped mid-stair for a moment and then he thundered down the rest of them. There were two long spiders legs poking through the letterbox. A spider was trying to squeeze its way inside. Roaring, Laurence charged at the letterbox and swung the bat. He caught the inside flap of the letterbox with full force. The flap clanged shut severing the legs that were poking through. They dropped to the floor and began to shake just like the spider had done in the spare room. A thin trail of bloody pus was snailing its way down the bottom half of the front door. The inside flap of the letterbox was dented, but it was mercifully still intact. Laurence headed quickly for the kitchen and his bottom draw. He thought that he had some duck tape put away for emergencies. When he opened the draw he was thankful to see that it was still there. He took it back to the front door, put down his bat and set to work taping up the letterbox.
“Ain’t none of you fuckers going to get in here now,” he said to the front door. He grabbed his bat and returned the tape to the bottom drawer. His next stop was the emergency cupboard. He routed in the bottom section and came up with two bottles. The one from last night had probably two centimeters of whiskey in it. He uncapped it and drained the last of the liquid from the bottle. His stomach knotted at first and then it accepted the new influx of poison that was descending into it. Laurence discarded the bottle and took the full one back into the living room. He checked Chloe over, she was still snoring, but not with the ferocity that she had been doing an hour ago. He checked her forehead again. It was still sweaty, but it felt more like a normal temperature. Her eyes followed him again.
“Chloe, can you move at all? Try and move your hands,” he said. He looked at her hands and he thought that he saw the tiniest twitch in the fingers, but nothing more. He sat down on the floor and rested his back against Chloe’s sofa. He unscrewed his bottle and took a long pull from it. The sensation of the hot whiskey hitting his stomach instantly made him feel better. He took three more long hits from his bottle and then set it down for a little while. He was starting to feel the alcohol race through his mind and it felt good, it felt real good. Still, there was something lingering at the back of his mind that he couldn’t quite put his finger on, something that he had seen but not quite registered. He got up onto his knees and looked at Chloe again, this time taking the blanket off her. It was her arms. There were short black hairs growing on her arms. They weren’t flat straight hairs like a normal human either, they were barbed. They looked like the hairs on a spider.
13.
The journey to Newtown hadn’t begun until mid-morning, round about the time that Laurence was first coming round. Briggs had taken Lorna to the rear end of the van and sat her down in the corner. He had made her another cup of tea and sat opposite to her. He reached into a cupboard behind him and brought out a box file that was so full it wouldn’t even close properly.
“This is everything about the experiment from its conception to yesterday when everything went to shit. Everything you need to know about our friends out there,” he said jerking a thumb towards one of the windows.
“They are British spiders right?” said Lorna.
“Yes that’s right. But something in that virus has made them very aggressive. The element of the virus that was designed to accelerate their metabolic rate has caused them to need a substantial amount of food to survive. The most abundant source of food on this planet is us unfortunately. But, it would seem that our usefulness to us goes beyond just food. Some of them use a human body to incubate their young. When they begin to hatch they eat the body of the human they have been impregnated into.”
Lorna sneered in disgust, “That’s horrible. But surly you can destroy the body before they hatch, I dunno perhaps burn it or something,” said Lorna. She was barely able to believe the words that were coming out of her mouth.
“It would be the way to go but the incubation period is getting shorter and shorter. The last report we got was telling us that it was down to less than five minutes,” said Briggs.
“But that means….”
“Exactly. If they get to a populated area, then we are looking at a major problem. Every breeding produces several hundred new spiders. I have no idea how many people live in Newtown, but every one of them is at risk. The army were going to evacuate, but there isn’t enough time to get everyone out. If they breed then the numbers are going to get bigger and bigger. The only hope we have is to get the queen and lead the spiders to a place where they can be safely disposed of.”
“What about the virus?”
“The virus won’t spread, it isn’t strong enough. That’s why we were originally going to travel up and down the country and
release it at key points. If we do something now then we have a chance to stop the entire country being destroyed.”
Lorna drank tea and then set her cup down again. “How do we get rid of the ones we already have?”
“They are big, but they are also very fragile. You can kill one by fetching it a good kick. Once the army open fire on those fuckers, they won’t stand a chance, pardon my French.”
“How on earth are you going to get into Newtown without getting bitten by those things?” said Lorna.
Briggs shrugged, “Truth be known, I have no idea. I make these things up as I go along. If I think about it too much, then I will end up just doing nothing. If I do that then we are all fucked, oh pardon my…”
Lorna waved it off. She had heard plenty of swears living with Laurence all those years.
Briggs had offered her one of the long bench seats in the back to lie down on and try and get some sleep. The moment Lorna lay down in the semi-darkness she was convinced that she could hear the spiders outside trying to get into the van. At one point she had sat up and sneaked the tiniest peep out of one of the windows. It was hard to believe what she was seeing. Her stomach did at least three somersaults when she saw the scene outside. The car park had large spiders dotted all over it. Her car had two of them sitting on the roof and another one on the boot lid. The supermarket was still lit up like a beacon and there were spiders sitting on the outside of the window. Lorna couldn’t tell if there was anyone still left inside. Perhaps the spiders had made a meal out of the overnight staff, or worse, made a nest out of them. She came away from the window and shuddered. It really didn’t bear thinking about. She didn’t want to think about going into Newtown where the swarm had been heading but it looked like she had no choice left. Besides, she would rather take her chances in here with people who knew what they were dealing with then going it alone. That option was a no go. She wasn’t good with spiders in the first place, let alone overgrown mutant versions. She lay down again and pulled her blanket up round her neck. She closed her eyes and tried to think of anything else other than the monsters outside. It was a tough thing to do. Every ten seconds or so they would all take it in turns to make a clicking noise. To Lorna it sounded like they were somehow talking to each other. She wondered what it was they would actually be saying. At some point she fell asleep, because the next thing she knew there was the smallest sliver of sunlight peeking in under the curtains. She could hear voices mumbling to each other from the other end of the van and she sat up so she could have a look at what was going on. Briggs and his crew were already up and ready. She was about to get up off the bench seat when Johnny gunned the engine, making her jump almost out of her skin. Shannon turned away from the rest of the group and she caught sight of Lorna sitting up in her seat and made her way over to her.
“Hello again, did you sleep well?” said Shannon.
“With that lot outside? No, not at all,” said Lorna.
“Well, I’m afraid that situation isn’t going to get any easier, we are setting off for Newtown right now. There seems to be even more of them out there than there were last night. Johnny is going to have to just drive right over them. If you have a weak stomach you might just want to stay here and keep those curtains shut.”
“There is a big part of me that wants to just sit right here, but I have never seen anything like those spiders before in my life. I think if I sit back here I will be missing out on something. Does that make any sense?” said Lorna.
Shannon smiled, “I know exactly what you mean. If you want to sit up front with us then you can, but none of us will pass judgement on you if you don’t. Do you know people in Newtown?”
Lorna’s eyes misted over for a moment. She was recalling the many people she did know, and the one image that had stayed with her was Laurence. He had been so upset by what she had done, she couldn’t help but feel bad about it, regardless of how he had behaved whilst they had been together. She began to wish that she had ended things with him before she had started something else with Deke.
“….Earth to Lorna,” Shannon was saying.
Lorna snapped out of her momentary daydream. “Yes, I know people there, my husband…..well, ex-husband if you like, I don’t really know.”
Shannon raised an eyebrow at her, “Sounds complicated,” she said.
Lorna shrugged, “It is and it isn’t. Just last night we split up. That’s why I was asleep in my car when all of this shit hit the fan.”
“Split up eh? How come? Who was he sleeping with?” said Shannon.
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