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“Hey!” I wave my arms in the air, trying to get its attention. “Hey, you ugly bastard! I’m over here.”
Still, the spider seems to have a one-track mind and keeps trying to get at my friends inside the building.
I look around the forest floor and see a few fallen apples. I quickly pick three up and hurl them at the monster. One hits its side but does nothing to slow the creature down. The next one hits its leg but has no effect. The third one smacks it directly in one of its eight eyes, finally gaining its attention. The spider stops attacking the shack and turns to face me. Its massive fangs open and shut, making a loud clacking noise.
“This is insane,” I say to myself, still waving my arms in the air like an idiot.
The spider hisses and begins to scramble my way.
I run.
I run like my life depends on it because it probably does.
I don’t head toward the pond because that’s the direction I told the others to go to. I veer off to the west, hoping to lose the spider by maneuvering between trees and impeding its progress. The creature proves to be more agile than I first thought, as it weaves its way between the trees like they’re not even there.
My lungs begin to burn for air, at least that’s my first thought. I quickly realize they’re burning for a totally different reason.
Ahead of me, flames leap from tree to tree. The forest has been set ablaze, but I have no idea who could have started the fire. None of us had matches on us. Besides, there’s no way any of them could have gotten ahead of me. It’s a mystery that will have to be solved another time. Right now, I need to find a way to lose the spider who is closing in on me from behind and avoid being burned alive by the blazing inferno in front of me.
The spider begins to squeal so loud my eardrums feel like they’re about to burst. It picks up its pace, and I know I’ll never be able to outrun it. The click clack of its fangs grows louder behind me. Within seconds, the creature overtakes me, and I find myself running underneath its belly. I slow down as realization sets in.
The spider is no longer trying to catch me. Instead, its focus has changed to the fire, or perhaps somethinginthe fire.
It stops just short of entering the flames and squeals so loud I feel the ground beneath me shake. It shifts its body from side to side, desperately trying to find a way in, but its body is just too big to squeeze in between the flames. Wherever it steps, it’ll touch the fire and be burned alive.
The spider squeals again but this time it sounds like its heart is breaking. A chorus of high-pitched squeals answer in return.
Considering the way the spider is acting and the juvenile sound of the squeals that answered her, I’m betting this spider is a mother and her babies are trapped somewhere inside the fire.
I could run off and rejoin my friends, letting this creature die from heartbreak or be consumed by the fire trying to save its young. I owe it nothing. It tried to kill us. Why should I help it?
Yet, a little voice inside my soul warns that this moment will haunt me forever if I don’t try to help. Years from now, I can see myself waking up drenched in sweat from a nightmare mirroring this scene. For my own good, I should do something to prevent that scenario from happening. If I aid this creature, I’m doing it for me, or so I tell myself to help what I’m about to do make sense.
“Hey!” I yell at the spider, drawing its attention this time for a very different purpose.
The spider spins around to find me. Its dark eyes are frantic with worry.
“Are your babies in there?” I try to use body language to describe what I’m saying by cradling my arms like you would a baby before pointing toward the fire. The heat and smoke it’s putting off is becoming unbearable. I can only imagine how bad it’ll be inside the inferno.
The spider snaps her fangs together in response as a mournful whine escapes her mouth.
“I,” I use my hands to point to myself, “will help you get your babies.” I face the fire. “Where,” I spread my arms wide to encompass the forest before us, “are they?” I point to the flames, hoping she understands what I’m asking.
She lifts one of her legs and uses the hard tip of it to draw a crude map of sorts in the ground. If I’m reading it correctly, I need to go straight ahead until I come to a rock formation made of three boulders. She points directly in the center of the three circles.
“Okay. I think I understand.” Quickly, I pull off my shirt and fold it to make a mask. If the flames don’t get me, the smoke surely will if I’m not careful.
After studying the blaze, I see a way forward, but I know the conditions could change at a moment’s notice. I’ll need to go as fast as I can if I have any hope of getting out alive. I just hope the mama spider doesn’t eat me if I’m unable to save her young.
Before I lose my nerve, I make a mad dash over the wall of flames. Once I’m on the other side, I zigzag between blazes that will kill me and ones that only singe my clothes a bit. Every once in a while, I have to use my hand to put out a spark on my pants. My torso, however, will simply have to heal in time.
With the mama spider squealing to her young, their responses back aid me in pinpointing where they are. I really hope she’s telling her young not to eat the crazy human trying to rescue them. That would be helpful.
Finally, I see the boulders. They’re only five feet tall, so it only takes me a few seconds to scramble up them. This part of the forest doesn’t have as much fire, but it has plenty of smoke, making it difficult to see anything since my eyes are burning. The tears they’re producing to counteract the effect of the smoke isn’t exactly helping either. I use my shirt to wipe my eyes so I can see what I’m doing.
Built between the trio of rocks is a sack of some sort made from spider webbing. Within the sack, I see four small spiders, no larger than my hand, poking their heads out to see me.
“Okay, little fellas,” I say, rewrapping my shirt around the lower part of my face, “you guys are going to have to remain calm so I can get us all out of here.”
